


Of the Sun, Personified,

by cecilantro



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Caleb's Parents Aren't Fucking Dead, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Caleb-typical levels of trauma, F/M, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2019-06-01
Packaged: 2019-08-14 04:26:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 77,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16485899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cecilantro/pseuds/cecilantro
Summary: "Solazone’s full o’ weirdos and we’re all fucked up and we’re all damaged."Caleb Widogast arrives at Solazone Academy following the great catastrophe and the death of his teammates. He finds friends with stories similar to his own, people who he may one day be able to trust.But not thatfuckingMollymauk Tealeaf.There's no way he could ever standthatone.(Primarily Widomauk! Side storyline of Fjorester, some Beauyasha though I'm not sure how main story it'll be!)





	1. I dig ’til my shovel tells a secret

**Author's Note:**

> Titles for the chapters will come from Sleeping at Last's "Earth" !  
> If you don't know by now that I adore SaL, I can only assume you're new to me. Hi, I'm Luke, and I've written over 400,000 words of Widomauk fic.

Mollymauk Tealeaf, third year at Solazone Academy, has never been so free.

 

Note that to call them a third-year, whilst true, would imply that they have been here for three years- well.  
They have, in kind, though about a year of that was spent… somewhat ill.

(They don’t remember much. But that’s just how life goes when- when-)

As always, when the thought occurs to them, they feel their head twitch and flick it away. When they can sit down, when they don’t have to be awake and present, they can analyse it. They know what they remember- maybe they can pry it apart and find out what it is that aches them so.

 

But in their present- they hear Yasha and Beau calling their name below, almost angrily, and laugh as they clench and unclench their fists,

“When have you _ever_ had to worry about me?” They beam at them as they twirl in the air, the lavender of their skin dyed by their own magic- they turn the colour of sunset, gold washes over, around them and they soar along above their friends.  
The girls share a look of pure exasperation.

“Do you want to do it?” Yasha asks Beau, and can’t help rolling her eyes at the grin that spits Beau’s face.

“ _I can?_ ”

“Just don’t hurt them…”

“Oh, _gladly._ ” Beau steps in a little closer to Molly as they turn cartwheels in midair.

They catch sight of her a second too late,

“Don’t you fucking _dare-_ ”

There’s a shimmer of ice blue, and Molly’s magic flares under it, but they're not strong enough to fight the gravity. Beau yanks her clenched fists down, and Molly goes tumbling, letting their magic sputter out as they hurtle to the earth,

“ _Beau-_ ” Yasha warns, but she doesn’t need to. Beau swings one hand wide and Molly stops on a puff of ice blue, lowered carefully to the ground and she turns to Yasha with near-visible stars in her eyes.

“ _See!_ ” She grins, smug, “Told y’ I’d be good.”

“Stop fucking around, Molly.” Yasha’s words are heavy but her tone is affectionate, she comes to Molly’s side and hefts them to their feet, they chuckle at her.

“Why not? We’ve got time!”

“Not all of us can fly up th’ fuckin’ hill, Molls.” Beau rolls her eyes, and Molly raises an eyebrow in exaggerated confusion, looks around themself,

“Yeah- uh- yeah we can?”

“What?”  
  
“You just… anti-grav the three of us, and we blow up there…” they make a gesture with their hand, a smooth sweeping stripe in the air, “Like leaves!”

Beau blinks at them, her face impassive.  
And again.  
Once more.

“We should have left you in the dirt.”

Yasha whaps the back of her head, and Molly doubles over in laughter. When they straighten up, there’s a somber air to the group and they sigh the amusement away.

“It- it was rough. On everyone.”

“Not all of us died, Molly.” Beau points out, “A lot of us lost people, but not all of us died.”

“Well, look on the bright side.” Molly dusts themself down and shoves a hand in their pocket, withdraws an orange-ish mana crystal, and one in Beau’s colour, they load both into the clip of crystals they keep in the rotary cylinder of their scimitar as they draw it.

“What bright side?” Yasha asks, frowns, and Molly reaches out, blinking innocently, bops her on the nose with the scimitar and whips to smack Beau with the flat side before either can react,

“We’re leaves!” They crow, and there’s a gust of Molly-fueled wind that picks the three of them up and carries them along behind them.

They are far more elegant than the girls are, active control of their magic as opposed to quite literally tumbling along untethered, both Yasha and Beau give shouts of protest, but neither hit the floor. If they really wanted to, Beau could stop them, Molly doesn’t feel bad about this and it isn’t long before the spires of Solazone are spiralling into view ahead of them.

“I see it!” They call back, the wind whipping the words from their lips, neither of their friends hear but they see it too.

 

Third year students at Solazone Academy.

 

Here they _fucking_ come.

  


Up within the marble walls of the Academy, Caleb is already scouting out places to hide. He doesn’t want to be here. He wants to make his parents proud.  
It’s all very confusing.  
He’s pressed up against a wall in a corner in the courtyard, avoiding the eyes of the other third-years, by the Gods above and below, does Caleb hate strangers.

“Um.”

There’s a very small voice from his other side and he tries to whip his head around to see but ends up cracking it on the marble pillar instead and doubles over cursing. The stars bursting in his eyes send him reeling, dizzy, to the floor.

“Oh- I’m so sorry-”

Someone- whoever it was- shuffles closer and he feels tiny hands over his own on the back of his head for a moment, he sees silver wash behind his eyelids, and as the pain fades, the hands lift.  
Caleb blinks open his eyes. The world does not spin, but he is curled on his side in the grass.

“Thank you.” He murmurs, and then repeats a little louder when he realises how quiet his voice is.

“I didn’t mean to scare you!” the same voice tells him, and as he struggles upright, there’s another wash of silver that helps to pull him to his feet. Its source, it seems, is a hooded little figure hiding in the shadow that Caleb has just vacated, eyes glowing under their heavy cloak and twin trails of somewhat greasy-looking black hair down their front.

“I’m easily scared.” He placates, and she gives him a quick look-over, he can’t see her expression.

“Is it your first time here, too?”

“Ah- _ja,_ I- I transferred in from- from- um…”

“There were a few that collapsed last year.” She placates, “You don’t have to tell me which one.”  
  
It was all a big disaster.   
He’s quiet, for a moment, and then tentatively offers his hand to her,

“Caleb Widogast.”

“Nott,” She replies primly, “The brave. No comma,” and as she shakes, she tilts her head up and allows her hood to fall back from her face.

She’s a _goblin?_ Alright. Okay. Caleb’s seen stranger things in his life.

“We’ve got to go in sometime, Caleb.” Nott watches the trails of students, “There’s a lot of students down this year, I hear that they’re running us all through a trial and re-assigning some of us into teams.”  
  
“Does it work the same here?” Caleb asks, voice too quiet to be anything but worried, “That we are put into teams of four?”

“Pairs first, and paired pairs. Your partner is the most important one.” Nott corrects gently, and Caleb nods. Partners. Teams. He’s not-

He’s not ready.  
He will never be ready.

“Alright, let’s go.” he hears himself speak without permission, but at least one part of him isn’t warring for control. Nott nods invisibly, and the two of them creep out and fall into the parade behind a tall, green-skinned fellow and a smaller blue Hellborn, quite happily chattering the ear off of her friend. He doesn’t seem to mind, or notice, really, giving soft _mhm_ noises every now and then.

Caleb and Nott catch the tail end of a too-fast sentence,

“-Wonder who it’ll be! I’ve been _dying_ for a paired pair since I _got_ here, do you think they’ll put you with me this year?”

“Doubt it.” The green one’s drawl has a honey-thick accent to it, Caleb could place it, if he thought a little harder.

“Aw!” The blue one pouts, “Why not?”  
  
“‘Cause, Jes, we already got a full team. Yasha’s here t’day even if she does go on her wanders, an’-”   
  
“And _Deuces?_ He was threatening to leave last year! He had that huge meltdown in the dining hall! There were flowers everywhere!”

“Jes.” The green one jerks his head, tone irritated, “I was there. Don’t embarrass the guy, he’s had a time of it, an’ there’s people here that can overhear y’”

“Coming thro-ough!”

The call comes from behind and Caleb, out of instinct and with Trent’s voice singing in the back of his mind, throws himself to the floor.

“ _Fuck-_ ” Comes the green one’s voice from ahead of him, he hears heavy footfalls as he jumps out of the way and Caleb is a little ball on the floor begging the Gods to be merciful.

“Molly!” Comes Jes, the blue one’s voice, “You’re a dick!”

“What? What’d I do?”

Invisible to Caleb, Molly slips to the floor, lowering Yasha and Beau about thirty feet behind the group. Jester comes slowly to Caleb’s side,

“Look at the poor guy! You can’t spring surprises on us, we’re all- well.”

“Caleb?” Nott crouches next to him, “It’s okay, just- a bunch of weirdos enjoying themselves.”

Caleb looks up, blinking.

“We are not under attack?”

“No, we’re fine.” Nott smiles, steps back, and Jester does the same on his other side to give him space. Molly stumbles past Fjord,

“I’m _really sorry,_ I didn’t think a- a- oh.”

Caleb has straightened up in front of them.

“ _Oop,_ we’ll be late for Aemenyr’s assembly!” Jester looks at the closing doors, and Caleb looks around the group.

“Can any of you flash-step? And are any of you Earth Mages, with gravity control?”

“Oh, fuck, not another one.” Beau crawls up, “Yeah, I can do both.”

“I can flash-step.” Nott raises her hand.

 

It’s such a simple plan. The doors are too far to reach, but they close slowly.  
Beau shifts their gravity to lighten their weight, and then she and Nott shove the whole lot of them up to the doors, slipping just inside before they close too far to fit.

 

“Made it.” Jester fakes wiping sweat off of her brow. Fjord rolls his eyes.

Caleb tries to slip into the shadows.

“Hey, no, hold up,” Beau catches his arm before he can shuffle away and he looks at her with wide, frightened eyes.

She drops his arm.

“Sorry. Just, uh. You okay? Y’ had a pretty violent reaction, you know, there’s therapists here if y’ need to talk to someone.”

“ _Nein,_ it is not- it’s not a traumatic reaction. Just the way I was trained.”

“Ah, right, well… uh… Molly? Molly, you asshole, come here.”  
Yasha shoves a still-silently-staring Molly in her direction and they stumble over, wordless. Beau looks them up and down.

“Holy shit.” She says to nobody in particular, “You’re quiet.”

Caleb looks at Molly only briefly before he drops his eyes back to the floor, and Molly doesn’t speak.  
Somewhere in their head, Mini-Molly insists that they need to talk, to introduce themself, stop staring, punch Beau. But they’re too busy being completely and utterly shaken by this… beautiful man.

“Asshole!” Beau smacks the back of their head a little too hard, and they snap out of it to drive an elbow into her ribs. She heaves for breath at the sudden shock, and with a shimmer of blue, Molly collapses to the ground choking on their own slowly crushing windpipe.

“Too much! Too much!” Jester waves, ducks beside Molly as Beau’s magic lifts and sets her hands to their cheeks in waves of pink.

Fjord ducks in beside Caleb.

“Sorry abou’ that.” He smiles, offers Caleb a hand, “I’m Fjord.”

“Caleb Widogast.” He shakes on instinct.

“Caleb. Nice t’ meet y’, Caleb. This’n,” he puts a hand gently to one of Jester’s horns, and she tilts her head up to smile at him, “Is Jester Lavorre. That’s Yasha, Beauregard-”

“Beau.” She interrupts, and Fjord stalls,

“Beau.” He corrects himself with a smirk that tells Caleb it’s intentional, “An’ th’ one on the floor fighting for breath is-”

“Mollymauk Tealeaf!” They're up in a short burst of gold, wind settling around them, “Molly to my friends!”

They hold a lavender-skinned hand out to Caleb, and Caleb, as he shakes, notices Molly’s painted nails. They’re red, with gold detailing, little patterns that match their extravagant coat.

“I like your nails.” Caleb murmurs at them without really intending to, and Molly’s smile widens impossibly.

“Thank you! Yasha did them for me.” They wave at her, a tall, pale figure almost glowing in the dim light, and they add to the end, “I like yours too!”

Caleb looks at his nails. At this present time, they’re painted in a gradient of dark blue to slightly more vivid blue, with constellations meticulously painted as accurately as he could possibly get them.

“Thank you.” Caleb inclines his head, “I did them myself.”

“Well, aren’t you just _wonderful?_ ” Molly eyes him, Caleb shifts uncomfortably, and Beau takes mercy on him to interrupt.

“Alright, had your fun, c’mon. You’ll make us late.”

“Again.” Yasha smiles, and Molly rolls their eyes,

“I was in the medical ward, you can’t _blame_ that one on me.”

They trod off down the corridor, and the others begin to follow.

 

 

 

“They’re running us through like _first years_!” Jester protests, throwing her arms up, “Re-assigning partners and everything!”

“They won’t reassign y’ if y’ don’t want it.” Fjord rolls his eyes, puts an arm around her shoulders and pulls her into a half-hug.

“I don’t know. I kind of do, I want you ba-a-ack.”

The last comes out as a wail and they all have to pause for Jester to turn and press her face to Fjord’s chest. He sighs, but the sound is affectionate, and Beau comes up beside them both to run her fingers through Jester’s hair reassuringly.

“S’okay. No matter what happens, y’ain’t gonna lose us. We’re still here.”

“I think that’s the _nicest_ thing you’ve ever said.” Molly breezes by with Nott on their back, waving a hand airily. Beau whips around to glare at them, but they give her a smug, sudden look,

“You can’t hit me! I have Nott!”

There is murder in Beau’s eyes.

“I’m going to kill you again.” She promises, and Molly laughs,

“I look forward to it.”

 

 

The dorm rooms for the night are split almost in half between the group.

It’s more of a case of who gets where first, and Caleb finds himself split from Nott as Molly rushes off after Fjord, Nott still on their back, he watches the three slip into a room.

Jester looks at him and cocks her head,

“Aren’t you going after her?”

“Losing Nott for the night is a small sacrifice as opposed to spending the night with that… very loud Hellborn friend you have.”

Jester deflates visibly,

“You don’t like Molly?”

“Um.” Caleb shifts guiltily at the honesty, “Not… really, no.”

“Oh.” Jester looks glum for only a second, when she perks up again, it’s in the direction of Fjord’s room, “I’ll see you in the morning, then!”

“Yes- _Gute Nacht,_ Jester.”

It’s lost. She’s already gone, off into Fjord’s room with Nott and Molly, and Caleb makes a noise of surprise and relief as he makes his way into the other room.

 

There is someone already in here, and a cloud of steam that obscures most of their face, coming from a little tripod tea set.

“Oh, I- I’m sorry-” Caleb stammers, tries to take a step back and finds himself bumping into Yasha’s chest.

“Nothing to worry about.” She pats his shoulder, “Hello, Clay.”

“Hm?” a large, blue-furred hand wafts the steam away, and Caleb gets a view of a cow-like face, purple eyes, and a smile, “Oh. Hey, Yasha, Beau. Who’s the new one?”

Caleb looks around, and seeing nobody, gestures to himself.

“Me?”

“You’re the new one, aren’t you?”

“Oh.” Caleb scuttles forward and offers his hand, “I- yes. _Hallo._ I am Caleb Widogast.”

“Caduceus Clay.” he takes Caleb’s offered hand and shakes, “Would you like some tea?”

“What kind are you making? And may I sit?”

“Sure, sure. I’m making raspberry and echinacea tea.”

“Do you make it by hand?”

“Everything is by hand, Caleb.” Clay shuffles through a little bag, “But I do measure everything out myself.”

Caleb makes a nose of interest, and Beau huffs, shuffles to a bed and hops onto the top bunk.

“Y’ takin’ bottom, Yasha?”

“Do I have any other choice?” Beau swears she sees the edge of a smirk as Yasha comes over and slips onto the bed. It creaks under her weight.

“Not really, no.” Beau smiles right back, invisible to Yasha, she closes her eyes and relaxes, “It’s like bein’ home again, bein’ here.”

“Your definition of _home_ is… very odd.” Beau hears Yasha turn onto her side below her, “This just feels like training.”

“Yeah. Training. Home. Same shit.”

Yasha is quiet. She’s often quiet, but this is the quiet that tells Beau that she disagrees.

“Alright, what’s home to you, then?”

“I don’t think I remember, I just know that this isn’t home.”

When the quiet returns, it’s a sad kind, permeated only by Caleb and Caduceus murmuring over on the latter’s bed. Beau grunts as she shuffles to the edge of her bunk and tips herself upside-down to look at Yasha.  
Yasha is staring at her own hands, sadness and longing in her eyes, and Beau gives a soft sigh as she flips herself over to the floor.

“Hey, uh. Sorry.” she sits at the edge of Yasha’s bed, “I didn’t want t’ upset you or whatever.”

“It wasn’t you.” Yasha’s fist closes loosely, she pulls it under the cover out of sight, “Don’t worry.”

“A’ight, well, uh… y’mind if I just kinda sit here for a bit?”

She’s sat in pretty much the exact correct position to use Yasha as an armchair. If she leans back just a little, her back will rest against Yasha’s abdomen, and even through the thick quilt, the taller woman is warm. Yasha gives a quirk of a smile.

“I don’t mind.”

“Cool.” Beau leans back into Yasha and draws her knees up to her chest, “Y’ can sleep. I don’t mind.”

Yasha’s hand reappears from the covers by Beau’s ankle, outstretched and offering,

“Thank you.”

Beau takes her hand for only a second, squeezes her reassurance.

“S’a’ight.”

Yasha’s hand withdraws, and Beau listens as she falls asleep. She intends to go back to her own bed, once Yasha has fallen away, but by that time, Beau is far too comfortable to climb away. She turns, a little, folds her arms on Yasha’s side and lays her head atop them, falling asleep where she sits.

  
  
Over on Caduceus’ bed, he and Caleb have just finished splitting and sipping their way through twin tin cups of the tea, humming pleasantly at the taste.

Caleb climbs up to his bunk when he finishes, bidding Clay a sleepy goodnight as he goes. He barely has the energy to strip off his coat before he’s curling into a ball, ready to sleep.

 

 

 

“Fjord.” Molly says, top bunk, staring at the ceiling aimlessly, “Fjord, they’re reassigning partners.”

“Yeah. Yeah, Molls, I’m real fuckin’, startlin’ly aware o’ that. Jessie made sure to emphasise it.”

“I did.” Comes Jester’s call from the bunks she’s sharing with Nott, “I’m looking to get me a Fjord partner this year!”

It’s a poor imitation of his accent, but Molly doesn’t even laugh.

“Molly?” Jester’s voice shifts to worry, “Are you okay?”

“Do you think I might get Caleb as a partner?”

Both Nott and Jester wince and hiss quietly, too quietly to be heard.

“Anythin’s possible, Molly, includin’ you goin’ to sleep any time fuckin’ soon.”

“But Fjord. He’s new, and he looks scared. Imagine what I could do for him.”

“Jack him off?” Jester suggests helpfully, and again, Molly doesn’t laugh, or crow, just shakes their head slowly.

“No. No, I just- he looks like he’s holding the weight of the world on his shoulders. I don’t like that.”

“Your gold streak’s gonna get you killed an’ deprive _me_ of hard-earned rest. It’s almost one in the mornin’, you fucks, go to sleep.”

Fjord buries his face in his pillow, and Molly sighs softly.  
Jester looks between them.

“You’re _probably_ right.” She declares, and snaps her fingers, sending the soft pink lights of the room flickering out of existence and bathing them in shadows instead,

“Goodnight!”

Nott clambers up to her bunk,

“G’night.”

Silence settles for minutes before Fjord, half asleep, speaks,

“Molls. It’s been a hard few years. We’ve all seen people- yeah. Just… accept that y’ can’t save everyone. Y’ can’t heal everyone. That ain’t the magic you got.”

Molly looks at the end of their bunk, where their scimitars are strung to the pole and glowing dimly in Cree’s rust colours.

“I know.” They say, dejected and turns to their side, “But I can try.”

They will. Fjord knows they will, Fjord knows his friend, Fjord knows _Molly.  
_ He says nothing, though, just closes his eyes on the conversation and tries his best to fall asleep.

  


 

It is obvious, the next morning, which students got sleep, and which didn’t. On the other side of the little fenced-off area, Caleb can see a tall human-looking person with fox ears, yawning widely, a shorter human with dark skin practically falling asleep against their side.

Caleb’s mouth floods with the bitter green of jealousy and sadness. He misses Aeodwulf. He misses Astrid.

 

He will never see them whole again.

 

“You alright there, Caleb?”

It’s _Mollymauk_ , the ostentatious, overbearing hellborn of the day before. Caleb draws himself upright, tightens his shoulders, the way Trent had taught them.

“I’m fine.” He says, and his tone is cold and flat and Molly winces the way Caleb expects them to, “Just reminiscing.”

Molly is quiet.  
They come beside Caleb, lean on the fence and look into the distance, away from him, though the tail waves in the air unashamedly.

“Were you caught in the disasters, too?” Molly asks, voice quiet, and Caleb goes cold and still all over, “They were- they were supposed to have stopped him- years ago. But I suppose you- it’s like matter, like antimatter. They’re always there.”

Caleb’s face twitches in annoyance.  
This purple one cannot convince Caleb that they are philosophical in any sort of way, he’s seen this… thing flying like a leaf, unbound. That is no correct way to use air magic.

Astrid would disapprove.

He closes his eyes and for a moment, he sees the last half of Astrid he’d ever seen, the Husk’s jaw dripping with her blood and the horrible, mangled ends of her bones, her skull-

He’s alone, now. He can’t fall into that. He can’t panic.  
He opens his eyes again. Molly is looking over their shoulder, expecting a reply, and Caleb can’t give it to them. Even if he wanted to.  
Instead, he looks around, selects a spot not too far, near the fox-eared ginger he’d noticed earlier, and takes a deep breath.

And then disappears.

At least, from Molly’s point of view, one moment, Caleb is there. The next moment, there’s a shadow-print outline where he’d been, and then there’s nothing at all.  
Molly has seen teleportation before. But usually, it comes from- from the fucking teachers, the ones who have been studying magic for years, decades, even centuries in Aemenyr’s case. Not some scrawny little twenty-year-old with social anxiety.

Caleb is busy wishing that he was a Spirit Mage that could bend light around himself. He shifts as far from Molly as he can, and backs, quiet accidentally, into a stranger along the way.

“I am very sorry.” He tells them before he even sees their face, and then there’s a hand on his shoulder and he feels his anxiety easing from him, like an infected wound that has been lanced and drained.

“Calm down, kid.” The stranger tells him, and he looks up briefly into mismatched eyes before he looks away again. One blue, one black, with dark hair, pink at the tips. He can see the pink with his eyes on their boots, it reaches their thighs.  
There’s a ripple of a gold-yellow colour spreading through him as they withdraw their hand.

“I’m sorry.” He says again.

“S’okay. S’what I’m here for- Eris-Luna, one of the teachers, head of the Spirit department. Y’ain’t got no friends to plot with?”

“ _Nein._ ” Caleb grimaces, eyes still on their boots. They have yellow laces on gold boots. It clashes horribly. He loves them, “I transferred in this year from- from Solace, in- in Regulus.”

“Ah, the one in the heart of Leonis itself?” Eris-Luna nods, folding her arms, “I’m surprised. Solace is very particular with their students, once you’re in, you’re usually reluctant to leave.”

“My teammates, ah- they died. In- with the Husk outbreak.”

“That was damn near two years ago.” Eris-Luna tilts her head, “Y’ only just got here?”

“Yes.” Caleb’s history stays locked behind his tongue, a horrid and heavy weight that tastes of steel and flame, “I did.”

Eris-Luna takes this as it is, and nods her understanding,

“Righty. Well, good luck- you want some tips?”

“Tips?”

“First trial they go through, they’re gonna teleport y’ into the forest. First person y’ see without a partner is your partner for the rest of your time here, and y’ gotta make it to the other side. There’s some wild beasts in here, like boars, bears, the like, y’ get points for fighting ‘em, and bonuses for non-lethal combat. You get scored on speed, strategy, and fighting, though that’s just a formality since y’all are third-years. First-years get class culled by it.”

“That sounds… rough.” Caleb chews his lip. Eris-Luna nods.

“Can be. But y’ don’t have to worry about that- jus’ focus on strategy and gettin’ a partner. How ‘bout Molly, that lovely hellborn y’ were talkin’ to?”

Caleb pulls a face, and Eris-Luna laughs. Caleb swears there’s tattoos on her arms that weren’t there a moment ago, mimicking Molly’s- the snake winding down her arm, for one, the sun and moon on her opposite shoulder for another.

“Too much for y’?”

“ _Ja._ Obnoxious, loud thing.” Caleb’s face draws tight and Eris-Luna wipes a tear from her eyes.

“Give ‘em a chance. They don’t really know how to people,” she smiles at the phrasing, “They’re only a couple of years old and still learning.”

Caleb doesn’t question. It doesn’t seem as odd to him, that sentence, as it might have only a few years ago. He’s too quiet for too long, he feels someone trailing along the edge of his mind and repels at them mentally with as loud a noise as he can summon in his head.  
Eris-Luna reels, clutching their head in pain and letting soft gold dissipate.

“Sorry!” Caleb says quickly, and Eris-Luna shakes her head,

“S’understandable that Solace would teach y’ how to protect against Spirit Mages. But- uh- nah. Nah, I- I forget I’m a teacher now.” and she gives a crooked grin, “G’luck, Caleb.”

She’s gone, leaving only a momentary shadow imprint of herself behind.

Caleb never told her his name.

 

 

The students are separated into groups. All of the old teams are in the same groups, they have a higher shot at reforming.  
Caleb and Nott are put in the group of about twenty-eight students that just happens to contain Molly, Jester, and all of their friends.

Beau drops in beside Caleb at the fence.

“Sup?”

“ _Hallo,_ Beauregard. Are you nervous?”

“Nah.” Beau shrugs with one shoulder, “I’m _good_. I’m good at what I do, I was one of the top scorers on the entrance exam, y’know?”   
  
“I meant more like partners. Teams.”

“Huh.” Beau quiets to ponder this, “Are you?”  
  
“I am shitting my pants _as we speak._ Filling them up properly.”

“That’s- ew. Ew, dude, fuckin’ gross.”

“You asked.” Caleb points out, and Beau laughs. Actually, genuinely laughs, a little bark of delight,

“Yeah, that’s fair. I ain’t scared of teams, naw, uh- I got friends. They’ll- well. You know.” she gestures to her belt, where she has an array of little circular pendants, most of which are glowing in various colours, “They’ll keep me right.”

Caleb counts four colours. He knows Beau has at least five friends.  
He wonders who she’s missing, but before he can open his mouth and ask, a whistle blows, and then Caleb blinks. And when his eyes open again, he’s in the forest, with the uneasy jolt of teleportation in his throat.

“Fuck.” Caleb grumbles, “We started.”

There is nobody around  
He is alone.  
He sighs as he draws his dagger from its sheath at his waistband and flicks idly at the rotary cylinder until it reaches one in the right colour for ice, and he re-sheathes it again.  
The forest is quiet.

He forges on.

  
  


Mollymauk does not like to be alone.

So naturally, their first instinct is to stop by a tree and rest the tips of their fingers together, steadying their breathing, focusing their energy, and sending out a thin wave of magic to detect any kind of living creature nearby.  
It does not return any sort of result, but they wouldn’t put it past the academics here to ward the forest against detections.

Instead, Molly climbs a tree, uses the breeze to support themself as they hop quietly between branches, up, up, up over the treetops.  
And when they're up there, they can finally see over the leaves- there’s a spot that looks like the place they’re meant to be, and it’s in a _direction._

They float back to the leaf-strewn, autumnal colours of the forest floor below them, and begins on their way.

 

 

“Fjord.” Clay’s voice is as amused and calm as it always is, despite the fact that he’s hanging rather precariously from a tree by one ankle, “Mind getting me down? My head’s starting to spin.”

“Yeah- uh- just a sec’, Deuce.”

Fjord’s scrambling up the tree best he can before he realises that this means he’s- he’s _partners_ with Clay, now.   
  
“Hey, Deuce,” He starts as he tugs his falchion from his hip, “You realised, yet?”

“Hm?” Deuce strains to look up, more at the sensation of Fjord stabbing into the wood around his trapped foot than his words, “What?”

“We’re partners now.” Fjord grunts and manages to take out just the right chunk. Clay goes crashing to floor, sits up cackling, Fjord slips down the tree to join him.  
  
“Jester will be so disappointed.” Clay chuckles, Fjord offers him a hand and tugs him to his feet.

“Jester’s lived without me long enough.” Fjord smiles, and his hand goes automatically to the neckerchief, to the little pendant dragging down the pointed tip. He rubs his thumb across it almost idly, Clay has been here long enough to know a nervous habit when he sees one.

“Y’ rely on Jester a lot, huh?” and begins to push through the undergrowth, Fjord startles into stillness for a few moments before he follows,

“What? No? I- I just, we’ve been together a while, Jes’ ‘n’ me, since combat prep- we’ve just kinda always been partners.”  
  
“You miss her.” Clay says over his shoulder, like he’s stating the weather, and Fjord shakes his head,

“I see her daily, how can I _miss her_?”

“You don’t work with her any more.” Clay’s smile is soft and slow, and he makes sure to tilt his head so Fjord can see it.  
Fjord just sort of huffs, the same way Clay knows that he does when he’s flustered and caught out in his serious act.   
  
“She’s- we’re still- close.” Fjord says, and does not look directly at Clay, because he’s sure those eyes could cut straight to his mind.   
_  
She’s still under my protection. _ Fjord thinks, and does not say, and thinks of the collar that Jester wears around her neck. The black one, with the lace, with the little coin emblem blazing in his colour. He’d coat her in it, if she’d let him. If he’d tell her, she probably would.

“I find that honesty really helps to start and strengthen relationships.” Clay tells him helpfully, and Fjord does not reply.

  


Caleb finds himself in a bit of a sticky situation.

He plasters himself as close to the nearest tree as he can, his intelligent eyes trained on the brown bear mere metres ahead of him.  
He runs through the list of things that he can do.   
Using fire in a forest is far too risky, and he doesn’t really want to _hurt_ the bear. But if he gets too close, it _will_ hurt _him_ , and he does not want to be on the receiving end of those claws.

What to do?

He decides, eventually, to just try and sneak past, best he can, he backtracks some way and loops around fairly heavily and hopes to all the Gods that it works.

It doesn’t. Caleb edges around a tree, and comes face-to-face with a bear. A _bear,_ angry and brown and very, very big and he takes off running in the direction he knows is where he needs to be.

 

If Caleb thought he could outrun a _bear,_ he was very wrong.

 

A thought flickers across his mind that he may _have_ to harm the bear and then he considers that he doesn’t need to be alone any more.  
He twists and jumps out of the way just in time to avoid the bear barrelling into him once, and takes the deepest breath he thinks he may ever have taken. 

The resounding call for help rings across the forest.

 

 

There are a lot that hear it, there are a lot that dismiss it as mental fuckery, and then there’s Molly.

“Caleb.” They hiss under their breath and then they're moving, clattering through the treeline and casting out scanning waves as they move, getting only Yasha’s ping back as she trails them messily through the undergrowth.

“ _Caleb!_ ” Molly calls to the forest, just as they catch a faint drop of life on the very edges of their radar.

They do not get a reply, but they charge on anyway.

 

Caleb’s back is to a tree, his ankle feels- sprained, at the very least- and there’s a bear coming down on him.

 _This can’t happen._ He thinks dimly, _not after the Husks. They wouldn’t let this happen._

There’s a distant call. He thinks it might be his name.  
The bear takes a swipe at him and Caleb wishes he could close his eyes on those terrible paws- and then they bounce off of something invisible and Caleb almost grins. He _knew_ he was right.

He may be safe, but there’s still no way that he can walk like this, and the bear is still taking slow swipes at him, and that’s about where Molly bursts into view.  
  
“ _Caleb._ ” They gasp out, heaving for breath, and then they're rushing the bear, all lit up in gold. They run _directly into it_ and Caleb’s mouth drops open at their- either recklessness or bravery, Caleb can’t tell- _the bear goes flying_. Catapulted away by Air magic, Molly turns to Caleb instead,

“Are you alright?” They ask, as the bear stands and shakes itself, “Can you walk?”

Caleb feels a leaden weight in his throat. Molly is the first person he’s met with.  
Does that not make them partners?

“ _Nein,_ my ankle-”

“Look out-” and it’s Yasha’s turn to dive through the trees, she tackles the advancing bear with her whole body and brings with her a sense of deep relief. Molly has a partner. Caleb still needs to find one.  
Molly, who has tucked their scimitar away and is offering their hands to Caleb,   
  
“C’mon. Let’s move.”   
  
Caleb, reluctantly, takes the offering and lets Molly pull him up and slip to his hurt side, putting an arm around him to hold him upright.   
Molly catches his hand, once they’re standing, inspects his nails.   
  
“Your polish is chipped.” They observe mildly, “Yasha! Time to go!”   
  
“On my- way!” and a grunt, and Yasha re-emerges from the floor with a streak of dirt across her cheek. “We’ll be alright. Did you hurt yourself, Caleb?”   
  
“ _Ja,_ I managed to- to- to catch my foot in a tree root. I’m not sure of the extent of the damage.”   
  
“Are you alright with Molly supporting you? I can stay ahead and keep a watch.”   
  
“That seems to be the best course of action.” Caleb grimaces, and Molly grins, the group slowly begins to make their way toward the finish line.

  


Jester finds Nott hanging from a tree by her snagged cloak and writhing. Sparks of silver shine for split-seconds against the broken branch holding her up, but without a clear line of sight, Nott can’t quite get a mental handle on it. Not when she’s panicking. She can’t telekinesis her way out of this, and her throat is choked- she can’t call for help.

It’s not a life threatening situation, she doesn’t think. But it is an annoying one.

She’s started to play little games with herself by the time Jester arrives. How many red leaves can she see? How many squirrels? How many of those can she shoot, sitting here- and then she changes her mind, because she likes squirrels, they’re cute.

“Hanging around?” Jester is grinning up at her from the floor when she looks, holding a- a-

A Lollipop.  
A giant lollipop.  
That she sighs and jabs into the ground like a stop sign so she can lift her hands,

“I was hoping for Fjord as a partner this year, you know.” Jester muses to Nott’s shocked silence, her hands glowing pink as she carefully tries to unhook the cloak, “But it’s alright! At least I get to see him! And we’ll be trained fighters soon enough, you know? Do you know what- oh, got it!”

Nott comes hovering toward the ground, held up now by Jester’s magic, and she flares under Nott’s weight. She touches down and breathes a heavy, heavy sigh of relief.

“Thank you.”

“You’re _welcome!_ ” Jester grins, and Nott comes to her side, pointing her in the direction of the finish line.

  


Beau is sitting against a trunk in the treeline when Molly, Yasha, and Caleb come stuttering toward it. She scrambles up, pretty quick, does an exaggerated head count.

“Alright, three of y’ here, so which one _doesn’t_ have a partner yet? Yash?”   
  
Yasha shakes her head,

“Me and Molly again. It’s Caleb.” and she gestures to the ginger, still being held up by Molly and looking thoroughly pissed about it.

“Which means that he’s _your_ responsibility now,” Molly ducks out from under Caleb’s arm and Beau moves automatically to take their spot, “And _that_ means we’re going to beat you to the finish line! Bye, Beau!”

They take off running, and Beau’s mouth falls open.

“Fucking bullshit you are! Hey, Caleb, d’you get motion sickness?”  
  
“Um- _nein?_ ”  
  
“Alright. Tuck your head in or you’ll break your neck.” She picks him up from the floor with a ripple of magic, reducing his gravity, reducing his weight, and Caleb does as he’s told with the word _what_ dying on his lips as Beau shifts into flash-step, speeding past Molly in a literal blur, and pausing just before the finish line, grinning in wait. As Molly draws close, she steps backwards, Caleb still in her arms.   
  
“Told y’ it was bullshit.”

“Fuck you.” Molly pants, doubled over and gasping for breath.  
  
“Fuck you too.” Beau sets Caleb down and ruffles Molly’s hair with the newly freed hand.

  


Jester is not put in a team with Fjord.  
Again.  
And she is not happy about it.

The others skim their fingers over their names, Caleb turns to express his dismay to Clay that they’ll be on different teams, and Nott comes stumbling over, tripping on her cloak.

“Caleb!” She beams, her clawtips pressed to his heavy coat, “We’re on a team together! I can look after you properly, now!”

“You barely know me.” Caleb replies, but there’s a hint of amusement to his voice, and Nott’s sharp-toothed grin does not falter.

“Still, we’re on a team!” She shuffles a little, wiggles in place, “I want the bed closest to the door!”

“And I will ensure that you get it.” Caleb promises, and turns to squint over the heads of the other students in search of Beau and Jester. Nott scoots off to search between them for the same.

He finds Jester cuddling into Fjord’s mercilessly hard leather armor.

“You know, he’s much softer when he has the chance to get changed.” Clay offers placidly from Fjord’s side, towering over him still, and Jester makes a soft whimpering noise and presses only harder.

Fjord sighs softly and awkwardly pulls one arm around her shoulders.

“It’s th’ first night, Jes, if y’wanna come and hang out in our room ‘m sure nobody’d object.”

“I _certainly_ wouldn’t!” Molly bends almost at a right angle to emphasise the drama, breaking off of a sentence halfway through insulting Beau, “It’ll be nice to have the company of the second-most beautiful hellborn at Solazone.”

There’s a dramatic wink added to the end, and Caleb, watching from a few metres away, makes a disgusted noise in the back of his throat that Molly overhears, the pointed tip of their ear flicking just a little. They look from Jester- face smooshed to Fjord’s breastplate- to Caleb, who is turning a bright shade of fuchsia.

“Caleb!” Oh, dear the _Gods,_ they sound _excited,_ “How’s the ankle? Better?”   
  
“ _Ja,_ it was healed up once we settled in the waiting pen.” Caleb’s tone is dry and cold, he emphasises his point by rocking back and forth, shifting his weight from one foot to the other and back.

“Good!” Molly’s extravagant expression fades into a softer, more gentle smile, “I’m glad you’re alright.”

Caleb stifles another noise of disgust in his throat and turns away, missing the hurt expression that flickers across Molly’s face. Beau tugs them back upright by the collar.  
  
“Don’t… buy into his bullshit, or get too attached.”

“I can’t help it!” Molly says dramatically, the hurt buried again under a layer of theatrics, “It’s my hero complex!”

Beau smacks the back of their head, but gently. Far, far too gently. They frown.

“You’re not being a dick to me. I’m not made of glass, Beau.”

“No, but I’m worried you’ll get y’self in too deep with this new fuckin’ asshole, and I ain’t ready t’ dig you out of a grave.” She waves her hands, and pauses to frown at her words before she adds, “Again.”

“You won’t have to-” Molly makes air quotes around the words, “ _dig me out of a grave, again._ I know how to handle myself.”

Beau eyes them.

“No you fuckin’ don’t. You’d throw yourself in th’ path of a raging warlord if it meant you’d stand a chance at savin’ Yasha.”

“That doesn’t count.” Molly says, too quickly, “That’s Yasha. And you’d do the same.”

“I’d take a bullet for any of you fucks.” Beau gestures to the group and leans back against Yasha, who is watching the exchange with an amused smile.

“You’d do worse for her.” Molly gestures, and Beau tilts her head back against Yasha’s arm to meet her eyes, briefly, tucks her chin back down as she flushes.

Yasha’s smile twitches a little stronger, a faint, dust-like tone of pink to her cheeks and the bridge of her nose.

“Yeah? So?”

Molly, for all that he’d love to push this to it’s gag limit, decides that _no,_ they don’t want to. Beau- she’s finicky. They know Beau like they know their own mind- or morals, at least- and they know that teasing her too hard will catapult her in the opposite direction.  
They drop the tension in their shoulders that they never realise they're holding until it’s gone.

“So we have something in common.” They point out, “We’d die for someone.”

“You’d die for anyone.” Beau raises an eyebrow, and Molly frowns,

“And you wouldn’t?”

  
There’s a silence that feels, for all comparative purposes, like the soft lapping of waves against the shoreline of soft sand. Gentle now, quiet, but with the promise and potential of something terrible and fierce, should they shift the world in such a way to disrupt a moment far out away from them.

  
“Yeah.” Beau shifts to stand away from Yasha, avoiding Molly’s eyes, “Yeah, sure, whatever.”

And she shuffles off and away from them toward Caleb. Molly follows her with their eyes, watches as she comes up beside him, bumps his shoulder with hers, arms still crossed and eyes still on the floor. They can only imagine what they’re saying.

Talking shit about them, they don’t doubt.

 

The worst part of that is that Molly is not wrong.

 

“They always know just how t’ get under my skin.” Beau muses, scuffing at the floor, “It’s prob’ly accidental, but I can’t help feelin’ like they're tryna manipulate me away from Yasha. Like they want her to themself.”

Caleb shoots a look over his shoulder at Molly, currently looking sulky under Yasha’s arm.

“I do not have a dog in this fight.” He says to Beau as he turns away, “I don’t know Mollymauk well enough, and just because I do not like them does not mean that they are emotionally manipulative.”

“Molly’s- they're good, Caleb. They're got a good fuckin’ heart. I thought, when I met them, they were just another say-good do-nothing fuck-all, but- but- ugh.”

“Are you crying?” Caleb asks, startled, looking to her for the first time. Beau swipes her eyes with the back of her hand.

“No.” She lies flatly, and Caleb shoves a hand in his pocket to withdraw a pack of tissues.

“You look like you’re getting a cold.” he tells her, “Take a tissue.”

She glares at him, arms crossed, for a long moment before she slowly, tentatively plucks a tissue.

“Thanks.”

He doesn’t reply to that. He tucks the tissues away and stands silently at her side whilst they wait for everyone to settle so that they can head to their dorm rooms.

“Nott has claimed the bed closest to the door.” Caleb tells Beau as they begin to move, and it’s her turn to stay silent, only nodding for him.

 

Jester does not spend the night with them.

 

She does not tell them where she sleeps.

 


	2. Swear to the Earth that I will keep it

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caleb finds the tower. Mollymauk finds Caleb.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Content warning: There is mention and implication of suicidal thoughts and contemplation in this chapter.**

It’s not the first time that Jester and Fjord have slept together- as in, slept in the same bed- but it always makes him nervous. She knows he has nightmares, she knows how he can get, she knows he hates to cuddle and she knows how nervous he gets with her. Even now. Even after all this time.

She knows all of this and curls up behind him anyway, into a little ball against his lower back, her own blanket around her and the quilt separating them- Fjord prefers it that way. She knows she’ll end up with the quilt doubled over her, burrito-style, come morning. He never keeps it on.

He sits up and she stirs, looks over her shoulder and he smooths her hair back behind her ear,

“Just water.” He promises, she can see the smile he’s wearing like a mask and doesn’t believe him. He knows she doesn’t. She knows him too well.

“Can I help?” It comes as a whisper. Molly and Yasha are asleep in the two single beds they’ve turned into a double on the other side of the room, Clay- he’s probably asleep. If he sleeps.

Fjord shakes his head,

“I’ll be alrigh’.” He promises her quietly, “I just- yeah.”

Jester blinks slowly.

“Do you have your Link?”

Fjord reaches up and presses a finger to the device curled around his ear, it lights up, filling the nearby space with dim blue light.

“I always take it for y’.”

“Call me if you want me.” Her eyes are wide. She demands honesty, “Promise me.”

“I’ll call you if I want or need you.” He promises, his fingertips returning to her hair for a moment to add a physical weight to the words, “I’ll be back soon.”

“Love you, Fjord.” She yawns, settles back down, he can see her own Link as she activates it and sets it into her ear. If she’s asleep when he gets back, he’ll have to take it out.

“I know y’ do.” and he’s off, slipping out of the door soundlessly, and Jester’s unease keeps her almost awake, on the edge of sleep.  
  
Until he returns with his breath a little more ragged in his chest and slips into bed behind her.

There’s a moment of stillness in which she can only feel his breath heaving, and then she feels the skim of fingertips at her arm and she squiggles in the bed until she can free an arm and lace her fingers with his, soft pink filling the room as she explores his hurts with her magic.

“ _Fjord._ ” She whispers, distraught at the damage to his throat, like he’s swallowed a handful of caltrops.

“Go t’ sleep, Jessie.”

She melts. She always does at that nickname. But she still worries, there’s still a pink glow, and he shakes his hand free from hers gently, leaves her heart aching for moments. She can feel him moving, jolting, and then he’s curled around her with an arm over her, not _holding_ her, per se, but close, she can feel his breathing with his chest to her back and his face to the top of her head. Gently, he takes the Link from her ear, sets it onto the bedside table with his own.

“I’m okay.” He says softly, “I promise.”

Selfishly, she thinks, she doesn’t tell him that this only solidifies her belief in the contrary. But if she says that, Fjord might stop pulling her closer to him, and she doesn’t think her aching heart could handle it.

As she’s falling asleep, she could swear blind that Fjord kisses the top of her head. But she’s tired. She’s so tired.

She must be imagining it.

She _must_ be.

  


Beau goes to wake Caleb in the morning and finds his bed empty.

“Nott?”

“Yeah?”

“Y’ seen Caleb?”

“He went out just after dawn.” Nott shrugs, taps at her Link to activate it, “I’ll call him.”

“You have his details already?”

“I took them from his panel last night.” Nott shrugs, fingers working at the cat’s cradle, “He- oh. Hi, Caleb! Almost time for lesson, are you meeting us?”

“ _What is first lesson?_ ” Comes his voice back at her, and Nott hums as she thinks,

“Introduction to Magical Combat Year Three, with Rani Esther.”

“ _I will meet you there, then, it’s not far from where I am._ ”

“Where _are_ you?”

“ _Um…_ ” Caleb looks over the edge of the building again and scrubs at the tear marks on his cheeks, “ _Nearby. Exploring. I’ll see you there._ ”

“Alright.” Nott says cheerfully, “See you soon!”

“ _Ja. See you soon._ ”

Caleb cuts the call and slips down the wall until he’s sat on the edge. He can’t let Nott down. He said he’d see her there.  
The empty expanse of air below calls to him, but he’s not ready yet. Astrid calls to him, but he is not ready yet.  
He scoots along the wall until he can fall onto the open balcony of roof, and finds- oh dear- someone looking down at him where he lays on the cold stonework.

“ _Hallo,_ Mollymauk.”

“Caleb?” They frown, confused, “What were you doing on the _other side_ of the tower? You could fall…”

If there’s a dawning sense of realisation on Molly’s face, Caleb isn’t looking to see it. There’s a silence whilst Caleb slowly scrambles over, and finds Molly half-holding a hand to him,

“Can- can I help you up?”

For a moment, Caleb is confused. Molly is _asking_ _permission_ to help him up? Caleb takes their hand, leans into Molly pulling him to his feet.

“I- uh-” Molly does not look at Caleb’s face, and Caleb, in turn, avoids looking at them. He has not yet dropped their hand, so he takes the opportunity to shift gently and inspect their nails,

“Your polish is chipped.” Caleb says quietly, and he hears Molly swallow before they answer,

“It’s been a rough couple of days.”

“I can re-do it for you, if you want?” Caleb looks to meet Molly’s eyes only briefly. They’re still- too loud, for him, too much, but he feels he owes them for something and Molly is smiling. Oh no.

“I’d like that. Is this evening okay? Our room is basically opposite yours…”

“ _Ja,_ ” Caleb says, his plans for the night slipping into the trash bin, “I can do this evening.”   
  
“Say seven? Do you want to come to me, or should I come to you?”

“I will come through to you.” Caleb drops their hand at last, his eyes on the floor again, “Seven is fine.”

“Nice. Good. Great. Do you want a lift down to class?”

“ _Was?_ ”   
  
Molly wriggles their fingers, and they glow rhythmically in gold,

“I can sort of fly us down to the courtyard. Better than stairs.” There’s a smile on their face that fades quickly, “Better than jumping.”

Caleb freezes up, and Molly chances reaching out and setting their fingertips to his arm,

“If you want to- to- you know… I’m here to talk. Any time.”

Caleb gives a bitter bark of laughter, he can’t suppress it, and Molly takes a proper grip on his arm. Their skin is warm, even through the sweater Caleb is wearing, and their eyes- when Caleb meets them for a split-second- are genuine,  
  
“I’m not a therapist. I won’t pretend to be. But in a pinch, if you just… need someone…”

Caleb jerks his arm out of Molly’s grip and turns for the stairs,

“We are not friends, Mollymauk.” He says, voice cold, “Don’t pretend to be. I will see you at seven.”

Molly sighs and nurses the hurt in their heart,

“See you at seven.”

At least there’s that. There’s always hope.

 

Molly doesn’t tell anyone their suspicions of Caleb, not at first. They slip into class, Caleb comes through the doors a few minutes later and sits at the front, the desks are almost empty thus far- class doesn’t start for a good five to ten minutes, and Rani Esther is busy making notes at the front of the room.  
  
“Ma’am,” One of the other students of the room leans across their desk, “Weren’t we supposed to have Professor Lyulph for third year introduction?”

Rani looks up from her papers and her eyes seek the student that has spoken. When she finds them- a blonde half-elf- she smiles,

“We’ve been promising you Shu for two years now, haven’t we? No, he’s co-conducting the Year One class with Sholeh, I’m sorry! But he _will_ be taking you for your first combat lesson. Ever since- oh, that first year.” She laughs, but there’s a sadness behind it and Caleb turns to look over his shoulder, a questioning expression on his face, he catches Molly’s eye. They’re the only one he knows.

Molly shrugs at him, and Caleb turns away again.  
It’s in perfect time for Fjord and Jester to come in, and Jester is holding Fjord’s hand, a faint thread of pink drapes between them as they pull apart, like some kind of viscous liquid and it breaks into dissipation. Jester skips down to sit beside Caleb.

“Good morning!”

“ _Guten Morgen,_ Jester.” Caleb inclines his head, “Did you sleep well?”

Jester shoots a look over her shoulder to Fjord, sitting beside Molly and pulling them in to rest their head on his shoulder somewhat awkwardly,

“It was alright.” She says, soft, and it’s the first thing that Caleb thinks he’s heard her say without some kind of dramatic flair. He can’t comment on it, doesn’t know her well enough, and is saved from feeling bad by Nott and Beau coming into the lecture hall and waving at him.

  


“Okay,” Rani stands at the front of the now-full class, quieting them with the single word, “Sholeh has _kindly_ offered me a few of her robots, so I’ll be running three of you through your paces today.”   
In the back, Molly shifts to slip lower in their seat.

“I have one designed for first, second, and third years, but I’ll be assigning them based on how recently you’ve joined us. Let’s see… we’ll start at grade one- which of you are joining Solazone for the first time this year?”

Nott raises her hand, and Caleb, tentatively, does the same. He sees another hand on the other side of the room, a half-dragon with long, black hair. There’s a final hand at the back, from a dwarf, and Rani hums as she looks around the room.

“Alright.” She points at Caleb, and he feels his chest jump, “You- your name?”  
  
“Caleb Widogast.” His voice doesn’t shake. He’s proud of that.

“Caleb.” Rani nods at the other students in his row, and they begin to stand,

“No need.” Caleb placates, and in an instant, he’s standing beside Rani, leaving a shadow imprint of himself behind. There’s a series of shocked noises across the classroom- even Rani seems surprised,

“Teleportation? You’re so young?”

“ _Ja,_ it was a basic skill taught to us in Solace.” Caleb inclines his head, “Their curriculum was far different to this one.”

“I can see.” Rani replies, eyeing him dubiously, “I feel like this might be too easy for you, then, come-”

She draws him to the centre of the lecture area, and presses something at the side that makes her desk platform lower, new flooring covering over, forming almost a coliseum-style basin.  
Up in the back, Molly leans forward, gripping the desk so hard that their knuckles turn white.  
Clay puts a hand on their arm, gently,

“He’ll be alright.” he murmurs near directly into their ear, and Molly’s wide eyes don’t leave Caleb for a moment,

“What if he’s not up to this today?”

Rani takes a control from a stand on the side and presses another button. This one opens a hatch in the wall, and some robotic creature comes lumbering out.  
It’s somewhat like the skeleton of a small bear, with paw-like appendages equipped with claws, and a jaw contraption with sharp teeth. It seems to be made of various kinds of metal, at least.

“Are you ready, Caleb?” Rani asks, and Caleb drops into a combat pose that reminds Molly, at least, of Beau.

“ _Ja._ ” he says firmly, not a hint of doubt to his tone, “Ready.”

Rani presses another button, and the robo-bear stirs to life much faster than Caleb expected- it comes charging toward him and he curses as he jumps out of the way.   
Molly leans forward, hanging over the desk.   
Caleb can feel his blood rushing in his ears, but he breathes as calm as he can, swirls his hands in a complex motion that draws a circle in the air and- his hands are not glowing. Or they are, but in _reverse,_ drawing in light like a shadow, an impossibly deep blue and Molly’s jaw drops even as the students around them intake breath.

“ _Holy shit._ ” Fjord murmurs, and then there’s a flash as Caleb thrusts a fireball from his palm, dancing out of the way of the robot again. It strikes uselessly on the armor.

“Fireproof.” Molly murmurs, equal parts awed and horrified, “Figures.”

“What is he going to do?” Clay leans in, obviously as worried as Molly might be, and Molly shakes their head.

“I don’t know.”

Caleb curses internally this time, pulling his dagger from the sheath at his hip and checking the cylinder. He eyes the robot as it slashes at him, catching the lapels of his jacket, and that’s too close for his comfort. He takes a quick slash at the thing with the dagger, loosing all of the ice magic in the current loaded crystal to stop it in place, and he uses the moment of respite to flick through for the right crystal. He’ll only get one shot, he thinks, with his new plan, and it’s going to be a rough ride.

The ice fails, the claws come, and Caleb blinks out of place, reappearing behind the beast instead and taking his plunge.

He manages to lodge his dagger at a joint, and that’s all he needs- he bursts the crystal inside and lets go, leaving the dagger and the winding vines behind as he teleports away, to the stairs this time, to watch his work. It takes only moments for it to go still, and after a few long seconds of silence, the class erupts into cheers.

“ _Yeah, Caleb!_ ” Molly whoops from the back, jumping in their place, “I _knew_ you could do it!”

Caleb looks up to them, but it isn’t Molly’s face he’s searching for- it’s Clay’s. Clay gives him a sage smile and a nod, and Caleb smiles back.

“Expertly done, Mister Widogast.” Rani nods as she begins to shove the robot back into its hole, “At such a disadvantage, too!”

“My old tutor taught me that there is no such thing as disadvantage, only a vantage point that you have not yet found.” Caleb tilts his chin up, and Rani nods sagely,

“Good advice, in some regards. You can return to your seat- Mollymauk Tealeaf, stop hiding behind Caduceus and come down, you’re the next victim.”

Caleb teleports back to his desk and flumps across it, cheek to the cool wood,

“That was too much teleportation.” Nott whispers, and her fingertips find his arm in faint silver ripples. She frowns as she finds how right she was, “You’re almost drained.”

“I can replenish. Focus on Mollymauk.”

Focus on Mollymauk indeed. Rani has already pulled their opponent from its hatch, and it looks somehow crueler than Caleb’s, well-armored with vicious talons, and what looks to be a sharp beak. Caleb narrows his eyes on it from his place with his cheek smooshed to the desk.

“Ready?” Rani asks them, and Molly lets out a slow breath as they prepare themself, one scimitar in one hand glowing dimly in a green-blue, the other hand glowing in their own gold.

“Ready.” Molly affirms, and the weird flamingo thing begins to move. It has bladed wings, Molly finds, when they begin to whirl and cut a line down their face that their gold hand moves to immediately, they curse and roll under the wide swing of the wings. As they stand, they eye the flamingo and wipe the blood from their face,

“Alright.” They grunt, and drop their shoulders, widen their stance, “Alright. Alright, I’m ready.”

The flamingo wheels to face them, and Molly’s eyes narrow, scanning over for the weakest point. They spin the cylinder of their scimitar one-handed to an empty barrel and set it back at their waist, the flamingo grows closer.

“It’s going to shred them.” Caleb sits up, “It’s going to turn them to ribbons, what are they _doing?_ ”

Molly takes a deep, glowing breath, and then there’s a fierce bang and a bright burst that has every student in the room covering their eyes- save Jester, who throws her hands up and shields her half of the front row from the debris and broken metal.

When they’re able to look again, the flamingo is in pieces, electricity crackles around Molly’s hands in the afterglow of such a bolt, and they shake it off. They’re beaming, again, that simple smile that holds joy and nothing dangerous behind it.

Even Rani is speechless.

“ _Lightning._ ” She says, as Molly begins to move around, sweeping the broken pieces up with a magical breeze, “That- that’s a first. At least.”

“I spent some time studying it over the holidays.” Molly shrugs, gestures to the blonde half-elf who had questioned about Professor Lyulph, and they throw them a hunk of robot that had landed on their desk.

Rani blinks at the pile of metallic debris.

“Sholeh is going to kill me. You know that you’ve killed me?”

“Just doing my job, ma’am.” Molly bows deeply, and heads off on their way back to their seat. Rani wordlessly sweeps the pile of destroyed robot into its hatch.

“Okay,” She turns back, worry crossing her face, “Anyone that’s been here three years and wants to volunteer?”

A handful of hands go up, and Rani looks across them. Beau is one of them, waving lazily, and Rani sighs,

“Anyone who _isn’t_ going to completely destroy the robot?”

Beau’s hand goes down.

 

They trail out of class about fifteen minutes later having watched a positively uninteresting fight between a second, different half-elf with long, blond hair and Water magic, and a robot that vaguely resembled an armadillo, just as heavily armored.

“Coming for lunch, Caleb?” Beau asks, and Caleb shakes his head,

“ _Nein,_ I will see you back at the dorm later. I have something I want to do.”

“Alright, I’ll bring y’ somethin’, just in case. You got any dietary requirements?”

“I- ah- I do not really eat beef? Or… pork… or much meat at all?”

The texture annoys him.

“Veggie. Gotcha. Clay’ll pick somethin’ good.” she nods at him and trails off. Ahead of them, Molly looks over their shoulder and spots Caleb slipping away.

“I’ve got to do something first.” They tell Fjord, “I’ll see you soon?”  
  
“I’ll save you food.” Fjord promises, and Molly grins,

“My hero.”

They shift into the shadows and round the building before they shift their magic to float them up to the tower. The one they’d found Caleb in before.

 

They’re sitting on the outer wall when he arrives up the stairs.

“I thought you might come back here.” Their arms are crossed, their legs the same, one leg bouncing slowly atop the other. Caleb frowns at them.

“Why is it any of your business?”

Molly sighs,

“I won’t- I won’t say anything. I’ll just sit here, quiet, you just have to promise you won’t- won’t-”

Caleb looks at their face, and they seem genuinely distressed. For the first time, it registers to him as worrying, not annoying, and he comes to lean on the wall beside them.

“I won’t.” He tells them, quiet, but firm, “I have an appointment with you at seven. I can’t.”

Molly slips down to the balcony so that they can turn, mimicking Caleb’s posture, and true to their word, they don’t say anything. They just nod, lean on the wall, and look out over the grounds, over the hills.

The day is warm for being early spring, and Molly grows more tired the longer they stay up here, with the fresh wind and the warm presence at their side. They must fall asleep at some point, because the next thing they’re aware of is Caleb pulling them up and their arm over his shoulders. He wraps an arm around their waist, and they begin to move, a sleepy Molly lolling onto Caleb as they try valiantly to wake up.

“-Come on, Mollymauk, this is _very_ uncomfortable.” Molly catches Caleb saying, and they’re in the spiral stairwell when Molly really comes to themself, stepping away from Caleb best they can in the confined space.

“Sorry.” They murmur, rubbing their eyes, and Caleb- he smiles. _Smiles,_ and it’s for Molly.

“You were tired. And you stayed with me anyway. And you did not say anything.”

Molly smiles exhaustedly in return,

“I promised.”

“ _Ja,_ you did. Would you still like me to come and do your nails? Or would you rather wait until tomorrow?”

“No, no, I’d like you to do them!” They’ve reached a main corridor now, and Caleb waves a hand, conjures four globules of light that hang around the two of them and light the darkening path,

“Then I will collect my things and come over right away. It’s past seven now, anyway.”

Molly huffs in question as they slip their panel from their pocket and check the time and their magic status. They’re running at about ninety-five percent- unsurprising, seeing how they’d poured so much into the lightning.

“Hey, Caleb?” They ask, and Caleb hums to let them know he’s listening, “Would you give me your Link details?”

Caleb’s step falters. Molly’s panel is still in their hand, they’re watching him wide-eyed and almost afraid, and Caleb sighs as he withdraws his own panel.

“You want to watch my magic levels.” He says, even as he bumps his panel to Molly’s. They nod, unashamed of the truth,

“I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

Caleb is quiet whilst their details are exchanged.

“You know that we are still not friends, Mollymauk.” he can’t keep his voice wholly cold, but it still twinges in Molly’s chest to hear.

“I know.” They say quietly, and tuck their panel away, “But I’d like to be. One day.”

Caleb doesn’t give that a reply. He doesn’t know if he could. He wanders down the corridor instead, and Molly follows, trailing his light.

 

Caleb collects his tub of polish and heads straight on through to Molly’s room. He finds his teammates- who had been mysteriously absent- sitting in there already. Beau is braiding Yasha’s hair on the bed she shares with Molly, silent but gentle; Nott is sitting with Clay, still slaving over a little pot of tea; Jester is sat on Fjord’s bed, beside him, leaning against him somewhat but otherwise occupied with a sketchbook.

Molly sits on the bed they share with Yasha, the opposite end to the girls, looking somewhat sad and nervous.

“ _Hallo._ ” Caleb greets as he slips over to sit by them, like the last words they shared weren’t cruel and cold, “Do you have a bowl and some cotton pads? We will have to remove the remainder of your polish first…”

“Yeah, uh-” Molly leans over the side of the bed and runs a hand underneath, coming back out with their own pack. They set it on the bed beside Caleb’s, and it dwarfs his. Caleb colours, and Molly’s eyes widen in surprise,

“You have- ah- a much more impressive collection than I.”

“I- I collected a lot, when I was fresh. It was the one thing I could do without panicking for a while.”

Caleb doesn’t question. His own collection is small primarily because it’s taken him so long to shake the dysphoria that clings to the notion. Which is _stupid,_ he reasons, but hey- he doesn’t decide how the cookie crumbles.

They get to work slowly removing the chipped remainder of Molly’s current polish, caring for their nails and quiet settles on them, the only conversation in the room comes from Nott and Clay. There’s some scuffling as Jester sets her sketchbook down, and at some point, Caleb notices, she’s fallen asleep. Fjord has shifted, an arm around her shoulders and she’s leaning into him, asleep on his shoulder. He’s not paying much attention to her, as usual for him, flickering through his messages and updates on his panel with the other hand.

“Caleb?” Molly murmurs, drawing his attention back.

“Sorry.” Caleb takes hold of Molly’s hand again. Their hands are warm, and soft, and Caleb sets it gently on his knee whilst he flips through the colours, in both of their packs, “What sort of design do you want?”  
  
“I liked your gradient.” Molly replies, voice soft, “What about- could you do space? But with a glitter top coat for the stars?”

Caleb hums as he thinks.

“I have some ideas.” he tells them, “But you would have to give me free range.”

“That’s fine.” Molly gives him a brief smile, “I trust that you’ll do something pretty.”

There’s something in Caleb that twitches and hurts at that. At Molly trusting him. Even with this. He takes their hand in his own, and pauses just a moment too long, but Molly doesn’t comment. They’re patient.  
Caleb takes his time being careful with his gradients, with the liquid latex, with the precision- it’s astounding to him, he only ever seems to be able to keep his shaking hands still when he’s doing nail art.  
Molly doesn’t watch what Caleb is doing to their nails. They focus on Caleb’s face, on how dedicated and single-focus he is as he works, and it takes nearly an hour and a half before he sits back upright and holds Molly’s hands in his own.

“There we go.”

Molly inspects for the first time, and smiles immediately- Caleb has drawn little night-sky scenes on their nails, complete with city and forest skylines in black at the tips. The whole thing has a scattered glitter top coat, and the sky scene seems to have another layer under the silhouetting.

“Holy shit.” Molly whispers, and Yasha pats Beau’s shoulder for pause before she crawls over to look.

“Oh, that’s nice.” She observes, “Very well done.”

“Thank you.” Caleb sits back, and as he does, Molly catches his hand.

“You took yours off?”

Caleb’s nails are free of colour or pattern, plain right now, Caleb nods.  
  
“Worry.” He offers, and Molly nods understandingly.

“Can I do yours, then? Would that- would that be alright?”

Caleb looks to Yasha, and she nods, just a little.

“ _Ja,_ I suppose that would be okay.”

“Do you have a preference on what you want?”

Caleb is quiet for a moment, his hands twitching on his knees,

“ _Nein._ ” He says softly, “I trust you to make something pretty.”

Molly smiles so brightly that Caleb can’t bring himself to hate or regret what he’s said. He offers them his hands quite willingly, and Molly takes them, sets both on their own knees.  
They take their time, too, careful with their liquid latex and their care for Caleb’s hands and nails, and when they finish, Caleb is half asleep. Molly almost chuckles,

“Darling, I’m done.”

The pet name doesn’t even register to Caleb.

Yasha and Beau are asleep on the other side of the bed, both curled like commas and slotted together in near-perfect shape. Fjord has fallen asleep, too, his panel slumped to his side, leaning into Jester.  
Caleb looks down at his nails. They’re a dragonscale gradient pattern, with little constellations painted in the darker bits, and Caleb finds that he actually likes them. A lot.

“They’re very nice.” Caleb looks up to Molly, and his gaze flickers away again. He can’t bear to look at Molly- they’re still smiling. He can’t stand someone so happy.

“Are you going to be alright sleeping with Beau here?” Caleb jerks his chin toward her, and Molly shrugs,

“It isn’t the first time. The only things between them and not dating is Yasha’s obliviousness and Beau’s stubbornness.”

Caleb quirks a smile at that. He’s tired, and in his exhaustion, Molly isn’t so bad. They’re warm, and soft, and that appeals to Caleb being so sleepy. But his consciousness knows better.

“Alright.” Caleb begins to pack his things, “I will see you and the others in the morning, then.”

“Thanks for the nails.” Molly waves their hands, and Caleb inclines his head,

“Likewise.”

And he’s away, Molly stares after him as he leaves, breathing as regular as they can make it.

 

Nott looks up as Caleb slips out, and checks her panel for the time.

“Oh!” She seems surprised, “It’s almost one in the morning! We should really sleep.”

He hums softly,

“Probably, yeah. Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow.” and he makes no move to extinguish his little pot of fire.  
  
“You need sleep too, Deuces.” Nott frowns as she stands up, “Tea can wait.”

He opens his mouth to protest, looks at her, and looks away again, closing his mouth.

“Yeah, you’re right.” and he puts the lid on his little fire pot, “Goodnight, Nott.”

Satisfied, Nott inclines her head, and slips out to follow Caleb back to their room.  
He’s sitting on the bed when she comes in, staring at his hands and looking as though he’s seeing into an abyss of nothing, and Nott edges up to stand at the side of his bed,   
  
“Caleb? Is everything okay?”

“I can’t afford to care for people again, Nott.” Caleb murmurs, “I cannot get hurt like that again.”

Nott glances at his nails, at the scale pattern, and chews at the edge of her lip gently, just enough pressure to not break her own skin.

“You can’t stop yourself caring about people.”  
  
“I know.” Caleb murmurs, running a hand through his hair, “But I- I already care about you, and Beauregard, and Caduceus. Even if it is only a little.”

There’s a pause.

“What about the others?” Nott asks gently.

“Yasha, too, I could. I think. I do not- I don’t know her, yet, but she seems-”

“Molly!” Nott throws her hands up, “Jester, Fjord, people who worry about you!”

Caleb pulls a face.

“Fjord and Jester are sweet enough, but they seem too preoccupied with one another. Which works well for me, I suppose, because I do not have to care about them. And Mollymauk- I think I may actually hate them.”

“You’ve just spent three hours doing one another’s nails.” Nott points out flatly, Caleb shakes his head,

“I may hate them, but I have a heart. They seemed excited, and I did not want to deliberately upset them.”

Nott thinks about calling him on his bullshit, but eventually decides against it. She’s frustrated enough, so she sighs, and turns away for bed.  
Caleb makes no move to stop her, only stands to shed his clothes and change into nightwear instead. He folds his binder carefully, he always does, sets it under his pillow where it belongs and curls into bed. There is silence in the room, other than the soft sound of breathing.

It’s as lonely as Caleb thinks he could be.

  


Jester wakes up the following morning to Fjord actually cuddling her into him.

He’s asleep too, of course, but that doesn’t matter.

A huge part of her wants to go back to sleep here, cuddled up to Fjord, laid half over his chest, but her conscience is calling for her to draw back. She knows he wouldn’t want this if he was awake. If he had the cognitive function for it. She knows everything that he feels, she’s _attuned_ to him.  
So she wriggles, carefully, out of Fjord’s embrace.

Her panel tells her it’s just past seven in the morning, there’s another two hours, at least, before they need to get up for their classes at ten. Fjord stirs when she leaves him, frowns, and turns to lie in her spot but he’s still sleeping. She creeps up to his side, ducks over and kisses his hairline, where the scar meets hair and sends a shock of white back into it.  
She doesn’t say anything. And neither does Yasha, sat at the edge of the bed she shares with Molly, staring out of the window.

Jester waves as she leaves, and is lucky enough to get a wiggle of fingers in return.

As she’s closing the door behind her, Jester realises something odd.

Was Molly sleeping on Yasha’s side of the bed?

 

She heads into her own room and finds three of the four beds empty. Her own, naturally, but Caleb’s, and Beau’s too.

She reasons with herself that they must have gone out for early morning training, and doesn’t think too much more of it.

In Yasha’s room, Beau shifts and turns over to lie on Molly’s abandoned side of the bed. Yasha strokes her hair.

 

Molly trails Caleb up the tower silently.  
He’d pulled them out of bed just before dawn. As in, actually come to them and shook them gently awake and of course, they’d come.

“No talking.” Caleb had said quietly as they began their ascent up the spiral staircase, “No words. Just-”

“Okay.” Molly affirms, before Caleb can struggle himself too deep in the web of words, and Caleb- he relaxes. Molly sees it.

 

There’s nothing much different to the night before. They sit at the top of the tower, Molly on the wall facing out, their ankles crossed and swinging as the dawn begins to claim the sky.

“I lost my friends, you know.”

Caleb’s voice seems loud and jarring in the quiet of the grey-pink.  
Molly remembers their promise of silence, and shakes their head. They didn’t know.

“My team.” Caleb murmurs, “I was not fast enough to save them. I have seen horrible things. I know that we all have- have seen them. I know that we have all lost.” He sighs, shakes his head to clear the roiling clouds collecting on the surface of his mind like oil over water, “Everyone else seems to be handling them better than I am.”

“You’ve been here three days, Caleb.” Molly looks over to him, finds his eyes meeting theirs. They’re a startlingly bright blue.

“ _Ja,_ and I already feel as though I am falling behind.”

“There is nothing wrong with that.” Molly shrugs, “I spent six months falling behind last year as they speed-ran me through first and second year at the same time. I didn’t think I’d ever catch up.”

Caleb looks up, almost shocked,

“You did not do your first year here?” and then he realises how stupid that is. Of course they didn’t- Rani had said so yesterday. Molly shakes their head anyway,

“Didn’t do a first year _anywhere,_ not that I can remember, anyway. I’m only a year and a half old, really.”

Caleb doesn’t question. Just nods, like it makes perfect sense.  
They fall back to quiet, and Molly has to restrain themself from slipping into their usual habits of physical contact and reassurance. They’re so used to patting people, putting their hands to people’s arms, kissing Yasha’s temple, holding Fjord’s hand, Caleb is a new wave of difficulty for them.

“I don’t like you.” Caleb says, and it’s so quiet that Molly barely hears it, their pointed ear tips flicking against the wave of shock that doesn’t come crashing down. They knew that anyway.  
  
“Then why am I here?” They ask, just as soft, “You got _me_ out of bed. And I don’t mind, darling, really, but- why me, if you don’t like me?”

Caleb frowns into the morning breeze. The pink is beginning to fade from the sky, leaving patches of pale blue behind in the breaks between the clouds.

“I don’t know.” He admits, and it’s honest, “I cannot tell you.”

Molly lets a quiet fall as they struggle with their own words, with what the repercussions could be,

“I quite like you, you know.”

“I had gathered.” Caleb’s lips twitch almost into a smile, but not quite, “By the following me around to make sure I did not jump from the tower.”

“I’d do that for anyone.” Molly gives honestly, shrugging, “I just- I was just here, when you were. The first time.”

“Why were you up here?” Caleb looks at them sideways, and Molly shrugs again,

“You think you’re the only one that considers jumping, sometimes?” Molly laughs, an honest, airy laugh with none of the weight of what they’ve just implied. Caleb doesn’t frown, physically, but emotionally, he’s considering it.

They both let the silence stretch. They don’t speak at all until it’s almost nine thirty, Molly is shivering in the cold morning air, and classes are beginning to start below.

“Mollymauk?” Caleb asks, and Molly turns to him. Caleb, first, taps at their arm and sends a wave of near-black rippling across them, warming them magically.

“Thank you.”

“That- that wasn’t all. I- I would like to make… a deal? An arrangement? With you.” he stands from the wall, and Molly turns to do the same, slipping to the solid ground and brushing themself down,

“Oh?” They tilt their head, “What’s that?”

Caleb looks back out over the edge. And then to Molly, meeting their eyes.

“I won’t jump if you don’t.”

He offers a hand to them, and Molly stares for such a long moment that Caleb’s nerves begin to amp up.  
And then they take his hand, firm, they shake and hold their for moments far past what would be necessary.

“Deal.” They say softly, “If you jump, I jump too.”

“Likewise.” Caleb’s grip twitches marginally tighter on Molly’s hand, and they answer in the same way. Molly looks over across the Academy grounds, breathing for a moment in the calming, cool breeze of the early morning.

“Do you want a lift down?” They ask, looking at Caleb from the corner of their eye, and he smiles.

“ _Ja,_ I think that I would appreciate that.”

Molly looses from his hand and steps in to wrap an arm around his waist, and then the two of them are floating, carefully, off of the tower and sinking toward the ground. The wind that holds them aloft is cold, and Caleb shivers in it as they descend. If Molly pulls him closer- which they don’t, they definitely don’t- then it’s purely to keep him warm.

That’s all.

They’re not scared for him at all.

 

 

Molly and Caleb come into their combat class three feet apart and avoiding looking at one another. Their teammates are already there when they arrive.  
Caleb sits between Nott and Beau.

“Spent th’ mornin’ with Molly, huh? Didn’t think you liked ‘em.”

“I don’t.” Caleb says, and to his knowledge, it’s the truth. Beau frowns at him, like she’s confused.

“I can cut the sexual tension with a knife, Caleb.”

That does make Caleb laugh,

“I have never created or been part of sexual tension in my life.” And that, he’s sure, is honest. It’s hard to create sexual tension without some kind of sexual attraction behind it. And by hard, he means impossible.

“Sure.” Beau shifts, unbelieving. Caleb looks away from her with a familiar sickness boiling in his stomach, the same one that shifts into place whenever anyone nudges too close to his asexuality, the same one that holds all of his fears and hatreds from before the Husks came. They seem insignificant, in comparison, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t hate them.

He feels a gentle touch on the edge of his mind, but it isn’t probing, or searching, more waiting for him to acknowledge it.

 _‘Who?’_ He thinks, pushes to the forefront of his mind so that whoever it is that is reaching out to touch him is aware that he knows they’re there. He doesn’t expect an answer, but until they push deeper, there’s little he can do to stop them.

_‘Are you okay?’_

So he does get a reply. That’s- new. Trent never did that. Trent just reached for him when he least expected it and crushed his will into dust, just to show him how devastating the magic could be.  
He does not reply, though, they have not answered his question.

 _‘Yasha.’_   
  
The thought comes eventually, like a breath in his ear as Professor Lyulph comes into the class, then,   
  
_‘Molly is worried.’_

Caleb almost smiles at that. He looks over his shoulder to find Molly in the crowd of students, and it doesn’t take long for him to catch their red eyes over the tops of the others’ heads. He blinks at them slowly, even _manages_ a little smile, and watches as they relax and smile back at him.

He’ll keep his promise to them.

He’s never broken one yet.

 

Professor Lyulph pairs them up at random for the day’s exercises. Caleb fully expects to be paired with Molly- it would be exactly his luck- but he avoids it, paired instead with a blond half-elf dressed in neutral clothes, a morningstar hanging at their hip.

“Bryce.” they offer Caleb a handshake and a small, if tired, smile.  
  
“Caleb Widogast.” Caleb replies almost instinctively, shaking their hand, “Are you ready?”

“No crystals, no serious harm, careful with weapons?” Bryce lists off the rules to make sure Caleb understands them, and Caleb nods,

“Sort of hard, for a Fire Mage, but…” he shrugs, “I suppose that’s the point.”

“Third years.” Bryce agrees with an apologetic shrug, and the two of them separate and drop into combat positions.

“Ready?” Bryce asks, and Caleb nods, “Alright. Three, two, one… go.”

The switch in pacing is immediate. Bryce dashes toward Caleb,  who physically jumps out of their range, summoning something between cupped palms as Bryce turns for him and releases a stream of water from their palm, it loops around Caleb and Bryce smiles as though they’re sure they’ve won.  
And then Caleb disappears, and in the shadow-imprint of himself he leaves behind, a tiny bead of grey explodes into a thick cloud of smoke.  
The water lasso freezes around nothing.

And then Bryce feels heat at their wrists, unnatural, terrifying heat and they freeze still, a hand touches their shoulder.

“Are you okay?”

It’s Caleb, in their ear, clearly with the advantage but he isn’t gloating. His tone is genuine, there are thin bands of fire around Bryce’s wrists, just distant enough not to burn, they can’t move to direct their water.  
They shuffle their legs, and hear a soft tutting from Caleb, and then there’s flame banding around those, too.

“ _Nein, nein,_ no trickery. Do you submit?”

Bryce’s mind races and creaks, but their shoulders, eventually, drop.

“I submit.”

There’s no way they can get out of this without burning themself, they consider.  
Caleb’s fire dissipates, and a moment later, his smoke follows the same, though it isn’t Caleb that’s done it.

“Try _not_ choking us.” Molly gives Caleb a cheeky sort of grin, their residual wind dying in spirals of gold around their fingertips, and Caleb rolls his eyes.

“All is fair in love and non-damaging combat.”

“I’m particularly invested in the _love_ aspect.” Molly’s voice drops to the kind of purr that only a hellborn could manage, “Perhaps you could teach me some time.”

“Mollymauk!” Bryce sets one long-fingered hand over their whole face, “Less flirting, more fighting.”

Molly pouts under their palm for only a moment before they lick Bryce’s hand.

“Fuck’s sake.” Bryce pulls back, but the tone tells Caleb that this is, at least, a semi-common occurrence.

“You two are… friends?” He tries cautiously, and Bryce laughs, a light sound that could be likened to a bell, if Caleb was so inclined.

“You can call it that.” Bryce looks between the two of them,  
  
“We’re in competition for _most attractive genderfluid person_ in our year.” Molly tells Caleb, that cheeky kind of smile still in place on their face. Caleb’s eyes roll again without his permission, but he’s definitely smiling, now.

“Who’s your combat partner, Mollymauk?”

“Kara.” Molly waves a hand at the blonde half-elf who had questioned about Professor Lyulph, currently engaged in hand-to-hand with aforementioned professor.

“She looks as though she’s having fun.” Bryce observes mildly as the Professor manages to punch Kara straight in the nose.

“ _Ja,_ buzzing with excitement.” Caleb agrees.

Kara shoves the back of one hand to a bleeding nose and swings hard with the other. Professor Lyulph blocks such a lazy shot, but from this distance, Caleb can see what the Professor does not.  
Kara is feinting with the punch. As attention diverts to that, she sweeps low, pulling Professor Lyulph’s legs out from under him and kneeling on his chest when he hits the ground.

He chokes at the shock of it, but grins,

“ _Good job._ ” they hear him rasp, and Kara grins through blood as she stands up, allows the Professor to climb to his feet. Jester comes shuffling over and sets a hand to Kara’s cheek, away from the blood, glowing a vivid pink as she filters healing through and fixes Kara’s broken, bleeding nose. The class falls in.

“Thanks, Jester.”  Kara inclines her head, and Bryce condenses a ball of water from the air that Kara sticks her hand and face into to clean the residual blood.

Caleb finds himself swathed in jealousy for the class, they work so well together. He misses having this kind of bond with other people.  
But of course, when he’d had it, he was fine.

And then they’d _died._

“Caleb?” Molly’s breath is warm against his neck, they have a hand on his shoulder leaning in close and the rest of the class seems to be dispersing, “Are you in there?”

“ _Ja._ ” Caleb replies dully. He’s not really listening.   
  
“Alright.” Molly murmurs, and flicks through their rotary for the right crystal- one of Yasha’s that they know holds a deflection magic inside, “Alright, dear, alright. The scimitar’s coming, blunt side, okay? It’s alright, I’m not going to hurt you.”

“ _Ja._ ” Caleb affirms. He understands, in the vaguest, most foggy sense of the word, and Molly pulls the scimitar up and presses it, flat side, to Caleb’s chest as they activate the crystal.

Yasha has prepared five or six of these for Molly. They give off a magical aura for only a few seconds, but it allows them- and anyone with them- to travel virtually undetected. In actual terms, it makes them incomprehensible to any unprotected mind.  
With the crystal activated, it’s easy enough to pull Caleb along in an odd sort of hug, one arm and the scimitar pressed to his chest, the other around his hips and pulling until they’re out of the door into the fresh air of the day.

“Caleb?” Molly pulls him to the side as the magic fades away, “Are you with me?”

“ _Ja._ ” Caleb blinks and doesn’t quite meet Molly’s eyes, but it’s close enough.

“Can you tell me where we are?”  
  
Caleb struggles with that one for a moment,  
“Pollux wing, branch four, room thirteen.” He gives, and Molly chuckles,

“Alright. I would have accepted _Solazone,_ or even _here_ , but that’s even better. You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to, alright? Just a couple of yes or no questions.”

That seems like a question in itself, so Caleb nods, just so Molly knows he understands.  
  
“Good. Am I alright to stay with you?”   
  
Caleb frowns, but he nods, and Molly’s head cocks slightly at the expression,

“Would you prefer me to leave?”  
  
This earns them a firm head shake, which Molly visibly relaxes at.

“Thank you, darling- do you want to go to the tower?”

Caleb takes so long to mull this one over that Molly is about ready to repeat the question. And then he shakes his head.

“No? Alright, do you have an idea of where you’d prefer to go?”  
  
Caleb does. He nods, hard, and Molly offers their hand to him,

“Lead the way.”

Caleb takes hold of their wrist, instead, but it works out much the same. They pull Molly though the branch into the main corridor of the wing, and then out into and across the courtyard. He keeps pulling until they finally reach the dorms.  
He pauses, in the hall between the doors to both of their rooms.

“Would you prefer mine or yours?”

Caleb makes a beeline for his own dorm, Molly’s wrist released now, and heads in, holding the door for Molly behind him.

“Thank you.” Molly inclines their head, and sits on Caleb’s bed- marked by the book peeking out from under his pillow- as he wanders around the room changing quickly out of his combat suit.

Caleb’s combat clothes, save the coat, are much tighter than he’s entirely comfortable with, it’s a relief to pull that off and tug a turtleneck on over his binder. When he turns back to Molly, flushing with the knowledge that he’s forgotten they were there, he finds Molly with a hand over their eyes.

“Thank you.” Caleb says, and sees Molly smile behind their hand.

“It’s only decent, darling.”

Caleb, cautious, dubious, somewhat unwilling, shifts over to his own bed and sits on the opposite side to Molly. They seem to feel the dip as he lowers himself, but the hand doesn’t come down.

“Mollymauk?” Caleb says softly, voice shaking, he reaches out and touches Molly’s hand, sets his fingers to the backs of theirs, and when they lower it slowly, he wraps his fingers around theirs.  
  
Molly flushes, immediately, deep red-violet as Caleb shifts closer to them,  
“Caleb? Is- are you alright?”

“Ah- _ja,_ I- I- _ja._ ”

He shifts until he’s pressing to Molly, and they seem stunned, staring with wide eyes and flushed cheeks and then-  
Then they jump away.

“ _No!_ ” They exclaim, backing until they bump into Jester’s bed, “No, Caleb, darling, no.”

“I- you said that you were- were invested in the _love,_ I assumed that you wanted me to- to- to repay you for all of your- your help.”

There’s a race to his breath that worries Molly, and they drop their shoulders for the illusion of relaxation,

“Breathe, Caleb. It’s okay, I’m not- not upset. At you. I am upset, but not at you.”

“How can that… be?” Caleb shifts to sit on the edge of the bed, hands folded in his lap, fiddling with his own sleeves, rolling and unrolling them steadily.  
  
“Caleb…” Molly says, frowning, like it’s the only thing they can say, “If I sit with you, promise me you won’t do anything that you don’t want to do for you, and not for me.”

Caleb doesn’t look up at them, he looks at his hands, frowning. But,

“ _Ja._ ” He agrees, “I promise.”

Molly comes, cautiously, to his side, sits a foot apart from him.

“You don’t owe me anything.” Molly says quietly, “I’m invested in you for being you. Because you seem upset, and I like- I like to help people.”

“What do you hope to get out of this?” Caleb looks up to them, but only briefly, before his gaze slips back to his hands.

Molly shrugs.

“A happy Caleb.”

“Why?” Caleb’s frown deepens, “Why do you care?”

“Because that’s what I’m _about!_ ” Molly throws their hands up, “I like to leave people and places happier and better than I found them. No- I _need_ to leave people and places happier and better than I found them.”

Caleb cannot comprehend this, in any way, and Molly sighs gently and offers their hands.  
Cautiously, carefully, Caleb leans out for them, pauses a moment from taking them,

“You- you are not looking to gain anything from me?”

“Nothing you don’t want first.” Molly assures, meets his eyes with nothing but patience and calm and Caleb, careful, holds their wrists, instead, and Molly reciprocates. It’s a loose grip, mostly, just to feel their warmth.  
They sit in the shaded silence for a while, listening to the students that are milling around outside, clasped wrists loosely between them.

“I… am going to take a nap.” Caleb says, and makes no move to let go of Molly, “Would you stay? Not- I am not a- a cuddly person, but I would like to have- if you would, a physical presence just… within touching distance.”

“Sure.” Molly shrugs, “But would you mind if I changed out of my combat gear? Tight pants…” they jerk their chin at their legs, and Caleb chuckles as he withdraws his hands from theirs,

“ _Nein,_ no problem. I will be here.”

“Won’t be long.” Molly assures, pats Caleb’s shoulder as they pass him and disappear, and Caleb sighs gently.

He shuffles around the bed, shaking out the sheets and fluffing the pillows and then Molly comes in wearing loose sweatpants and a too-big shirt,

“I don’t usually sleep clothed.” They explain away, and Caleb offers them a smile. A small, but genuine smile. And Molly comes to the other side of Caleb’s bed and waits until Caleb’s climbed under the covers to join him, they lay slightly apart but just close enough to feel one another’s heat radiating, back-to-back.

“Mollymauk?” Caleb’s murmur is loud in the quiet of the room, and Molly hums to let him know they’ve heard. Caleb quirks a smile.

“ _Danke._ ”

“Any time.” Molly mumbles, sleepy into the warm air, curled into Caleb’s quilt.

 

By the time Jester slips in to check on Caleb, the two of them are asleep.


	3. Brush off the dirt, and let my change of heart occur

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caleb changes his mind about hating Molly.

Caleb and Molly accidentally miss another class as they sleep. It’s only the foundation on elemental magics, and Clay has taken notes that he knows he’ll give them both, just to keep them up to date.

“Why?” Beau frowns, leaning back against Yasha, “Why d’you care? It’s their fault for sleepin’ through it.”

“Molly is my friend, and my teammate.” Clay smiles lazily at her, goes back to copying his notes up another two times, “Caleb is their friend. And I like him, too.”

“Caleb seems like he’s having a _really_ rough time.” Jester pauses partway through braiding Nott’s hair to gesture with her hands, emphasising how tough a time Caleb is truly having. Beau scoffs, and Yasha jerks her arm, dislodging Beau from her spot and making her curse.

Fjord muffles a laugh.

 

 

Molly wakes before Caleb. They find themself staring at the back of his head, at the frizz of his auburn hair in the thin beam of sunlight that stripes down and bisects the bed between them. It’s a sense of separation that Molly, surprisingly, finds comforting.  
Caleb stirs, and Molly half-closes their eyes to give the illusion of sleep.  
  
Caleb turns over, rubbing at his eyes with the heel of his hand to face Molly. Molly, who has their hands tucked under their cheek, curled into a ball.

“ _Hallo._ ” Caleb murmurs, and Molly smiles at just the sound of his voice.

“Sleep well?”

“Much better than usual, actually, _ja._ ” and he pulls himself up to sit, yawning, stretching. Molly frowns a little,

“Did you sleep in your binder?”

Caleb freezes with a mixed sense of fear and horror, turning slowly over his shoulder,

“You- you are… aware? Of the binder?”

“Uh,” Molly tugs at their shirt until Caleb sees a flash of their own, unfastened binder, “Yeah.”

“Mine does not- not unfasten, or unzip, or… you know.”

“I can install a zip for you, if you want.” Molly sits up beside him, “I’m pretty good at sewing.”

“I… would appreciate that, I think.”

“I can also just straight up make you one.” Molly shrugs, “Also, would you mind?” and they pat at the zip of their binder, “I can make it but it’s a lot of effort I don’t want to put in.”

Caleb sighs gently, almost affectionately, and turns to zip Molly’s binder back up. The extra panel of material underneath folds neatly as he does, and Molly gives a soft, relieved groan when Caleb finishes.

“Thank you. You’re a sweetheart.” Molly grins at him as they slip out of bed, and Caleb mimics, slowly stretching to test just how tight his muscles have wound during his little anxiety attack.

Molly pauses on their journey to the door, turns back to find Caleb meticulously rolling his sleeves,

“Caleb?”  
  
“ _Ja?_ ” He looks up momentarily. Then back to the sleeves.

“I know you’re not a touchy person, but- uh. I am, so… if you ever need that. Or a hug. Or something.”

Caleb blinks to meet Molly’s eyes,

“Are you asking for a hug, Mollymauk?”

Molly shifts their weight.

“Uh. Kind of. Yeah. If you’re alright with it.”

Caleb’s face remains impassive for so long that Molly begins to back out of the door with apologies spilling from their tongue. And then he stumbles quickly across the room and pulls his arms around Molly’s shoulders.  
They give a soft, grateful sigh and reciprocate, relaxing into the gentle pressure that Caleb is rubbing between their shoulder blades.

Well, they always have been a fan of being hugged by someone taller than they are.

Caleb makes a surprised noise.

“I like this.” He says quietly, and Molly squishes him a little tighter.

“So do I. So anytime, you know, I’m here.”

Caleb tilts to press his face to Molly’s hair, grazing his cheek awkwardly against one horn,

“I’ll keep it in mind.”

 

 

Caleb and Molly spend the evening at the top of the tower.

They collect their saved food from their teammates, and Molly flies up with it, meets Caleb a few minutes later when he puffs his way up the stairs.

“I offered you a lift.” They shrug as he doubles over to relieve the pressure on his ribs and heave breath in.

“ _Fuck you._ ” he wheezes, and Molly gives a light laugh, the kind that makes Caleb smile at the sound of genuine joy,

“I thought we agreed _not_ to do that?”

Caleb just sighs and comes over, drops his rolled blanket and waits until Molly has spread it on the floor before he sits.  
The warm colours of sunset streak the sky above them as they begin to eat. Clay has picked for Caleb a bread roll, a pot of soup, and a baked potato with optional cheese. Molly has soup and bread, too, and a pot of pasta with chicken and bacon that they’re already halfway through cramming into their mouth.

“You enjoy pasta.” Caleb says with a hint of humour to his voice, and receives a _mm-hmm_ in reply. Molly waits until they’ve swallowed to speak,

“Pasta is good, and it fills you up well. There is nothing wrong with pasta.”  
  
“I never implied there was!” Caleb sounds fake-scandalised, smiling at Molly as they pretend to glare and shove another forkful of pasta into their mouth. He taps his soup and there’s a wash of blue-black across the tub before it starts steaming gently.

“Whoa.” Molly manages around a mouthful of pasta, eyes wide, they swallow, “I forget how cool Fire Mages are.”

“We are not cool. We are hot by principle.”

“Yes, you’re very hot.” Molly winks, and Caleb groans,

“I walked into that one.”

“Yes, you did.” Molly gives him a smug smile and they go back to their pasta pot, looking thoroughly as the cat that got the cream.

They eat in silence for a while; Molly glances up occasionally to make sure that Caleb is still smiling into his soup with half-lidded, distant eyes, cheeks full of soup-damp bread.  
The pinks and oranges are fading into deep purple when Caleb speaks again.

“I’m still not sure if I like you.” He admits, eventually, “In fact, I think that I hate you, sometimes.”

“You’ve known me- what? Four days?”

“Three.” Caleb corrects with an odd sort of smile, “But the way that this-” he taps his head, “- works, it feels like- like a lot longer. It keeps changing. Every few seconds, there’s something new to consider, a different viewpoint-”

“Well, I like you.” Molly shrugs, “So you’re not getting rid of me. Even if you hate me.”

“Even if I hate you?” Caleb echoes, disbelief to his tone, “Why would you stay around someone who hates you?”

“I promised you that I wouldn’t jump if you don’t. So I have to make sure you’re sticking to it, because you promised, too.”

“I won’t break a promise.” Caleb frowns, almost like he’s sulking, and Molly only smiles,

“Nor will I. But I like to be sure.” and they shrug, “You’re not allowed to die, Caleb Widogast. Promise?”

Caleb chuckles at the absurdity of it, but Molly is offering a hand with a genuine, serious smile, and he realises- they mean it.

“I won’t die.” He says, “And you can’t either. Promise?”

Caleb takes their hand. They’re the same colour now as the horizon, a dusky kind of purple with hair like the night sky above Caleb’s head, the silver of their jewellery like stars against the depths and their eyes- crimson though they are, they remind Caleb of the sun just before it sets completely over the horizon.

“Promise.” They agree, “We can not die together.”

  


“Fjord.” Jester pins him- physically pins him- in the hall. He may be a good foot taller than her, but she’s stronger, and when she has one arm either side of his ribs against the wall, glaring at him, by all the Gods, she is _terrifying._

“Jes.” He replies, and hopes he doesn’t sound nervous.

He absolutely does.

“Something’s wrong.” Jester points out perhaps a little too aggressively, “You’ve been, like, _really_ cuddly and I don’t want it to stop because I _like_ it when you’re all cuddly but I know that you’re not cuddly unless something’s wrong, and I’m worried about you.”

“Breathe, Jester.” Fjord soothes, and chances a hand to her shoulder that she relaxes into for a moment, and then shrugs off,

“I’m breathing, I’m breathing, but- but- Fjord, what’s wrong?”

“Ain’t nothin’ you can fix, Jes. S’alright.”

“It’s not alright! Two nights in a _row_ now you’ve actually _cuddled_ me whilst we slept and usually you’re not exactly happy about me even _being_ there and I’m just as sweet and loveable as I’ve always been so I know it’s not me!”

“D’you not want me t’ be cuddly? D’you not want hugs an’ that?” Fjord frowns, his pulse races in his chest and Jester steps back to fold her arms and look away.

“That’s not fair.” She tells him, sounding hurt, “You know I do, I just- I want you to be _you._ And that’s not- that’s not you, not that big a change, not that fast. You don’t get to use the things that I want to try and force me to stop worrying about you, you big dummy! I’m gonna worry anyway.”

Fjord is quiet as he watches her. Tears spring and fill her eyes and she ignores them as long as she can, only moving to swipe at them when the first one rolls. And from there, they only get thicker.

“Jester…” He says softly, and reaches out for her. She draws back like she’s been burned, and it’s Fjord’s turn to be hurt.

“You don’t get to use how I feel about you to try and force me to lay off.” She chokes, “I’m not- I’m not that selfish.”

“I know y’ain’t, Jes, c’mon. I promise this one ain’t t’ stop y’ askin’ questions.”

She lets her arms drop and sprawls against him, sobbing loudly, and he hushes her and strokes her hair with one hand, keeps the other heavy across her shoulders,

“You still have to tell me what’s wrong.” Jester hiccups into his chest, and Fjord sighs softly,

“I- I’ve been havin’ th’ nightmares again.” He tells her, voice quiet and clipped with worry, “Th’ nightmares, th’ impulses, the ones with th’ eyes an’ the wings an’ th’ vases- they’re driving me _nuts,_ Jes. An’ when I’m- when you’re there, when you’re with me, they don’t come so much.”

“I’m like a- a dreamcatcher?” She sniffles a little and looks up, and her face, her eyes are swollen from the crying and Fjord sighs affectionately,

“You are, in fact, my dreamcatcher.” He assures her, “But I don’t know if havin’ y’ near me puts you in danger, too. I don’t wanna risk _you_ jus’ so I can sleep better, y’know?”

“I’m happy to, though.” Jester frowns, “I want to help!”

“I know, I know. But everythin’ in moderation, right? Spend some time with Caleb an’ your new team. Y’ always know where I am.”

Jester pushes her face back to his chest and takes a deep, shuddering breath.

“I know.” She says, muffled by his hoodie, “I love you, Fjord.”

“I know y’ do.” He replies, and pulls her tighter to him in the silent hall.

  
  


 

“We have,” Beau rolls physically out of bed and onto the floor, “A lecture.”

“ _Ja,_ that comes with the academic territory, Beauregard.” Caleb doesn’t even look over. He’s pretty sure he has a decent beat on Beau’s somewhat bratty personality by now.

“I hate lectures.” She groans, and wriggles until she’s sitting up. Caleb gives a soft, hard breath that she recognises, vaguely, as a laugh.

“Molly’s a good influence.” She drags herself onto her bed again, “Y’ seemed so miserable when you arrived. ‘Least you’re, y’know, not mopin’ anymore.”

“That’s not fair.” Nott butts in, halfway through scrabbling her way into her warm, casual sweatshirt, “He has the right to be sad.”

“We’re not debating _ethics,_ we’re just discussing how terrible, bad, and annoying fucking _lectures_ are.”

“They are… not the most enjoyable.” Caleb borderline agrees, and Beau makes a _loud_ noise of shock something akin to _aha_!

“You pretend you’re a big nerd, but you’re actually just like the rest of us!” She declares, stripping out of her pyjamas, “And where’s Jester?”

“She has barely slept here since we were teamed up.” Caleb shrugs, “She’s spending her nights with her partner.”

“Oh,” Beau looks over her shoulder with wide, surprised eyes, “Jester isn’t dating Fjord, y’know.”

Caleb frowns.

“She spends most nights with him. He very obviously loves her, and she’s in love with him. But they are not dating?”

“Nah, Fjord has some psychological bullshit goin’ on, so Jester’s mad for him but they had some deep conversation about why he can’t get into a relationship or offer, like… hugs and bullshit?”

“But- no. No, I won’t question.” Caleb sighs and closes his book, reaches up and tucks his hair behind one ear so he can put his Link in and activate it.

He’s hit immediately by three messages from Molly.

 _‘Hey Caleb,’_ the first plays automatically, _‘So- uh- I was wondering if you maybe wanted to make that picnic thing a nightly… nightly? Affair? Or weekly. Or monthly. Or semi-regular. This is not me asking you on a date.’_

“Oh Gods.” Caleb groans, and there’s a soft buzz of silence between that and the next message,

_‘Caleb, I’m really sorry about that mess. Sti-ill up for that picnic. I’m not used to new friends like this, Yasha and Beau kind of integrated me into their friend group when- yeah? Anyway, sorry. Sorry.’_

Caleb puts his face in his hands.

‘ _Hi, it’s- um- Yasha. Jester and Fjord have gone… missing? Just- Molly said I should let you know. They’ll probably be back. Probably. See you in class.’_

Beau looks over as he straightens up,

“Y’hear about Fjord an’ Jester too?”

“ _Ja,_ Yasha left me a message.” Caleb slides off of his bed, “Should I be worried?” 

“Eh…” Beau shrugs, splays her fingers like a fan, “Sometimes Fjord disappears. Not so much Jester, though, but they should be alright. Maybe they started bangin’ and went to find some fuckin’ privacy.”

“Maybe.” Caleb shrugs, “But we can worry about that later. We’re due for the lecture, and we don’t want to be late. Ready, Beauregard, Nott?”

“Yeah, ‘m comin’.” Beau scuffles toward him, and Nott straightens from her bed, too,

“Ready!”

The three of them head to class.

 

 

 

Jester and Fjord are not at the lecture when they arrive. They do not turn up for the entirety of the lecture- nothing too important, just re-covering the basics of mana crystals and what can be contained within them- and when they leave for lunch, Molly falls into step beside Caleb with their arms crossed,

“You haven’t seen Jester either, hm?”

“She rarely sleeps in her bed.” Caleb shrugs, “I last saw her in your room last night, before we went to the tower.”

“Ah. Yeah, about- about that, I don’t know if you checked your Link-”

“Mollymauk.” Caleb says flatly, cuts them off, “I have checked my Link. I thought it was probably a better idea to reply to you in person- I would like to make it a regular thing. Perhaps not nightly, but a couple of times a week, certainly.”

Molly’s concerned face splits into a bright grin and they clap a little, throwing themself at Caleb and winding their arms around his neck, chuckling the whole time.

“I’m _so_ relieved, I thought I might have pushed it too far.” 

“The hug is a bit much.” Caleb says stiffly, and Molly jumps back immediately,

“Sorry!” they hold their hands up like a placation, “Sorry.”

“Best remember that next time, hm?”

“Yeah, I will. Sorry.”

“Mollymauk, it’s alright.” Caleb’s teasing drops to serious, genuine honesty, “You don’t need to worry so much.”

“I’ll remember next time.” Molly promises with a smile, and Caleb returns it,

“Thank you.”

“Guys?” Beau turns to catch their attention, “Fjord and Jester are in the canteen.”

“Oh?” Molly looks away from Caleb, “Are they okay?”

“Dunno.” Beau shrugs, “They just left me a message sayin’ they’re in th’ canteen, so I guess we’ll find out in a minute.”

The canteen is looming in front of them, now, with students from all year groups milling in and out, and teachers easing the flow. Caleb sports Eris-Luna, holding the door open. She waves at him jovially, and he wriggles his fingers back.

 

 

 

Jester and Fjord are sat in a far corner of the hall, pressed close to one another. As they get closer, Beau is the first to spot Fjord’s split lip.

“Holy shit.” She says as she thuds into the seat beside Jester, “How the fuck?”

Fjord looks at Jester briefly, and she gives him a bright grin and a smug nod.

“Jester an’ I decided to let out some of our more annoyin’ frustrations in a little fist fight.” He says, awkwardly, like he’s trying to keep the words inside.

“I won.” Says Jester, one eye blackened but only slightly. Fjord, on the other hand, looks somewhat like a weird green raccoon.

“Clearly.” Caleb sits beside Nott, Molly settles in between him and Fjord, takes Fjord’s hand gently and casually and turns to Caleb,

“So, now we know these two are alright,” They jerk their chin at Fjord and Jester, “Want to organise our next picnic?”

“That was what was holding you back?” Caleb’s head cocks and amusement plays at the edges of his lips, “Our friends?”

“Well- yeah. I care about them.”

Caleb blinks at his lost half-joke and sighs,

“How about tonight?” He suggests, “We can collect some more food whilst we’re here…” he looks around the room, squinting, and feels the briefest brush of Molly’s fingers to the back of his hand. As soon as he looks, it’s gone, they’re pulling their hand back. Caleb is halfway between relaxing and disappointed- he likes Molly’s warmth against his skin, but he can’t risk anyone realising that they care about one another.  
Molly notices him jerk toward them.

“Later.” They promise, “Anyway- Tonight?”

“ _Ja,_ tonight. Seven?” 

“As usual.” Molly flashes him a bright grin, and turns to Fjord as he tugs at their clasped hands.

“Did we miss much?” Fjord asks once their attention is on him, and Molly shakes their head.

“Same as last year. Mana crystal basics and what you can and can’t put in them.”

“I still can’t believe you can’t catch flash-stepping in it.” Nott rolls her eyes.

“It makes sense t’ me.” Beau rolls her eyes, “Y’ain’t really affectin’ like, yourself, so much, but the space an’ time _around_ you?”

“To-may-to, to-mah-to.” Nott shrugs, “it still sucks!”

Caleb leans forward on the table and rests his chin on his folded arms.

“Mollymauk?”

“Hm?” Molly looks over to him, breaking their conversation with Fjord momentarily, “Yes, dear?”

“I may take a nap.” and he snuggles deeper into his own jacket, “Wake me if we’re moving?”

“Will do.” Molly pats his arm lightly, briefly, and then Caleb falls asleep.

He feels no hunger, and he trusts himself to his new friends. Molly waits a moment, a few moments, and then gently, they stroke their fingers over Caleb’s hair. Caleb makes a distinctly cat-like noise and lifts his head a little, sleepily, presses into the touch for a moment and then collapses back to his rest. Molly gives a soft breath of laughter, an affectionate smile, and turns back to Fjord.

 

 

Caleb is up at the tower before Molly that night. The sunset colours are bright and beautiful in the early spring sky, and they stain Molly’s skin in jewel tones just as beautiful as the sky itself as they skim down and drop lightly to their tiptoes on the wall. Caleb looks up at the whirl of the wind.

The picnic blanket is already set up. Caleb has managed to procure a picnic basket from somewhere or other, and he has that set to the side, with a couple of glasses, bottles, some sandwiches. Molly drops gently to the floor and plops down their own bag of food,

“Is that wine?”

“Fjord said that you prefer rosé.” Caleb smiles and withdraws one of his bottles. Molly’s face splits into a bright grin,

“Mister Caleb, you _gift!_ You _minx!_ Trying to get me drunk, are we?”

“If you get drunk on a couple of glasses of wine, Mollymauk, I would say that you deserve it.” Caleb flashes Molly a nervous, tentative smile, and pours them both a glass.

Molly takes it and gestures as though they’re silently toasting, sighs after their first long sip.

“Perfect. Perfect, Caleb, thank you- food?”

“Ah- _ja,_ that’s a very good idea.” Caleb shuffles about, plating them both up some food. They’re halfway through their plates in amicable silence when Caleb speaks up without looking at Molly,

“You and- and Fjord, are you- together? I know Jester has feelings, but-”

“No!” Molly seems genuinely startled, “Fjord and I are close. He was my first friend that was… emotionally… there? I only knew Yasha and Beau.” The last comes as Caleb cocks his head and wrinkles his nose in confusion. He gives a soft _ah_ of understanding, and gestures with his wine for Molly to continue,   
“Yeah, Fjord and I are- close. I’m a general exception to his whole _not so much physical contact_ rule, mostly ‘cause he knows it keeps me calm.”

“But you were holding hands.” Caleb’s little confused face is back, and Molly leans forward, resting their chin on their knuckles.

“Yes?”

“But only lovers hold hands.” Caleb seems- genuinely baffled, “It is a mark of romantic affection. It’s how you show the world that you like them.”

“What the _fuck_ have they been teaching you at Solace?” Molly sits up, disgust in every line of their face, “ _No,_ holding someone’s hand doesn’t have to be romantic, but yes, it is a public display of trust.”

“Oh.” Says Caleb. He looks at his hands, his glass set aside, and Molly watches for a moment before setting their own glass down.

“Do you want to try?” they ask, and they keep their tone as gentle and unthreatening as possible, looking somewhere near Caleb’s forehead instead of into his eyes. Caleb looks at them suddenly, wide-eyed and shocked and mouth slightly ajar,

“Ho- holding hands?”

Molly feels something inside them twinge in mixed pity and amusement. The way Caleb says it makes it sound like something dirty and forbidden. _Gods,_ what did they do to him?

“Yeah. Just here, nobody else needs to see.”

Caleb swallows the worry in his throat,

“I- _ja._ I want to try.”

And he lifts his hand almost like he’s a mime in a box and Molly startles slightly at the unconventional positioning.

“Alright.” They murmur, more to themself than Caleb, “Alright, then.”

They lift their hand in a mirror, slowly, reaching for Caleb with their fingers curled slightly. The moonlight is beginning to lift over them, the purples of sunset only a distant breath on the horizon, and the pale blue-white seeps all of the colour from Caleb’s hair and makes his blue eyes brighter, more beautiful.

Slowly. Tentatively, they grow closer, and the first time that Molly’s fingertip brushes Caleb’s, he draws back suddenly, as though burned. But after a moment of holding his hand to his chest and taking some short, shaking breaths, he reaches out again.  
This time, when he touches Molly, he only flinches slightly. Molly presses their fingers harder to Caleb’s, soft flesh bows, and Molly blinks to catch his attention,

“Still alright?”

“ _Ja._ ” Caleb replies without looking, and he sounds breathless, awed.

He gasps a little when Molly tilts their hand and slips, slowly, their fingers to lace with Caleb’s. They curl their fingers first, prompting Caleb to do the same, to hold their hand properly. They’re fortunate enough to have their thumb on the outside, and they brush a rhythmic pattern to the side of Caleb’s own.

“Oh.” Caleb murmurs, “ _Oh._ This- this is nice. I like this.”

Molly smiles without Caleb seeing, he’s so transfixed by their joined hands.

“Yeah?” They ask, softly, and feel Caleb’s fingers twitch tighter against their own.

“Please do not let go.”

“Oh, I don’t plan on it.” Molly’s grin changes, not softer, but something different. There’s less teeth, more warmth in their eyes, Caleb looks at them and smiles in the moonlight. A true, wide smile that Molly hasn’t seen before now.  
“But if we’re going to be eating- not letting go, dear, just rearranging…” 

Carefully, Molly slips their hand from lacing their fingers with Caleb’s to just… holding. The way that means they need to shuffle over and sit beside him, shoulder to shoulder, holding his hand.

“There we go.” Molly smiles, “Better?”

“ _Ja._ ” Caleb sighs, “Thank you, Mollymauk.”

“No problem. Uh- Caleb?”

“Hm?” Caleb looks back from his new glass of wine to Molly’s face, and in the moonlight, their nerves make them look… young. Not entirely physically, but in emotions, they look far less than their roughly twenty physical years.

“Can- would it be alright if I kissed you on the cheek? That’s- I don’t mean that romantically either. It’s just- something I like to do.”

Caleb remembers seeing him do that to Jester, to Yasha, not to Fjord but that makes sense to Caleb. He doesn’t like much physical anyway.

“Just- this once, _ja_?” 

“Not again unless you say I can.” Molly swears, patting the spot on their chest where their heart hides, “Promise.”

“Alright.” Caleb agrees, and Molly gives a soft, relieved sigh through their nose.

“Thank you.” They murmur right by his ear, and then they’re pressing their lips to his cheekbone just beside his eye and Caleb thinks his brain explodes inside his head, there’s such a rushing, roaring noise. For a moment, he completely loses himself, like he’s smudged and blurring beyond his outline and then Molly sits back and he’s catapulted into his body with dizzying force.

“Caleb?” Molly sounds alarmed, “Are- are you alright?”

Caleb finds his free hand pressing to his cheek where Molly had kissed, his breath comes in little gasps, and his fingers twitch between Molly’s.

“This is- this is a lot.” He says, voice choked and quiet, and Molly looks at their joined hands,

“Do you want me to let go?”

“No- _nein,_ the problem is that- that I want… more.” Caleb shifts to wipe the gathering tears from his eyes with a free hand, “But there is a part of me that keeps reminding me this is not- not normal. Not allowed.” 

“Caleb, you’re not at Solace anymore.” Molly’s voice is gentle, they turn and place a hand on Caleb’s far shoulder, tugging him to face them, “Those rules don’t apply here. Solazone encourages trust and affection, and I encourage it even more! I like to do this-” they squeeze Caleb’s hand, “- with my friends. It reminds me that I’m alive. That they’re alive. And I need to know that.”

Caleb’s hand finds Molly’s shoulder and tugs them in toward him into a somewhat awkward hug. He does not let go of their hand, and by the time Caleb has settled his chin on their shoulder, they’re almost in his lap on their knees but they hold there whilst Caleb shudders against them.

“It hurts.” He says quietly, and Molly gives a breath of laughter,

“You’re touch-starved. You should let go, work up to this.”

They make no move to do so themself, handing Caleb all of the control and he takes their advice, slipping his hand from theirs and drawing back. Molly smiles, when they’re all settled again.

“I’m always open to any of that.” They tell Caleb as they lean over for the strawberries they’d managed to grab, “So if you need it, you know where I am, or how to find me.”  
He looks at them, marginally confused, and Molly taps gently at Caleb’s ear, roughly where his Link should be. He catches the shell instead, but it gets the message across.

“Thank you.” Caleb inclines his head and steals a strawberry, and Molly just laughs into the night air.

“Any time, dear.”

 

 

 

Caleb wakes the next morning and he is not in his bed. He is not in a room at all, the morning breeze is fresh on his face and he- he should be cold. He isn’t cold. Why isn’t he cold?  
There is a combination of answers to that. The first is that there are three blankets bound tight around him, all in varying ostentatious colours and patterns. They very obviously belong to Molly.

And that leads him to the second reason that he is so warm.

Molly.

Sat in his lap, head on his shoulder, wound around him and sound, sound asleep.

 _Holy fuck,_ how much did he drink last night?   
(By the look of the tower platform and the empty bottles strewn across it, a lot. It will come back to him, in time.)

He wants to be nervous. He knows he should panic, here, should freak out and teleport away but Molly is warm and feels nice against him. And they’re asleep. He can go back to sleep, he can pretend he didn’t know, he’s sure Molly will come to their senses before he does. He’s sure, nevermind that it’s seven in the morning and their next lesson is at one that afternoon. He sighs softly, closes his eyes, and tilts his head to lean against Molly’s, pulls them closer in to him, tightens his grip. He can feel their breathing against him, the rise and fall of their chest- he doesn’t remember when he removed his binder, or when Molly undid theirs, but he can feel that his breath comes far easier than it should; he’s definitely not wearing it.

Their breath is warm against his own collarbone, it seems to ease the ache in his head just to feel that they’re alive. And the ache in his head _is_ fierce, after all.

He takes a moment- his last sip of consciousness- to wonder if he would be this way with anyone else.  
Perhaps.   
Perhaps Nott, possibly Clay, if either of them would ask or offer the way that Molly has. Only Molly has gone out of their way to earn a fragment of trust from Caleb’s broken heart, from Caleb’s aching mind. To Nott, to Clay, it came naturally, and it comes to the others with just as little help. It is, was, will be Molly that troubles him, that pulls him between two halves of a juxtaposition. He can’t quite decide if he hates them or needs them, not overall, but he knows as he falls asleep what his choice is.

He needs them. Here, bound around him tighter than the blankets ever could be, breathing softly against his neck.

 

 

He was right, he finds, about Molly making the decision for him. It seems around an hour later that they stir, Caleb wakes with them but stays still, fakes his sleep, waits. He hears them murmur to themself as they come to, hears their soft _oh no_ breathed softly against his throat. A softer _I’m sorry_ and they begin to draw away, shaking the blankets loose, and Caleb can’t quite suppress his whine at the cold air.   
Molly springs away, still half-tangled in the blankets, 

“Caleb?” they ask, softly, as though they are afraid. Caleb allows himself to wake, blinking against the sudden light and the radiance of Molly in the mid-morning.

“Molly?” He replies, “Did we sleep here?”

“Uh- uh, yeah- wait. You… called me Molly?”

“It will not stay that way.” Caleb assures, but there’s a smile that tells Molly that- well. It’s likely true. But it doesn’t mean much.

The two of them shake themselves up and begin to pack away their mess, walking close by one another even as they work separately. As they move, as Molly bends and picks one bottle from the floor and counterbalances by reaching their free hand beside them, Caleb makes the first impulse decision that he can remember making since before Solace School.

He takes Molly’s hand.

Molly freezes quite suddenly, fingers around the neck of the empty bottle, and they turn carefully to look at Caleb.

“Is everything alright?”

“I- _ja,_ it’s fine, I just- I like… this.” 

“Oh, sweetheart.” Molly’s heart aches at how guilty Caleb looks in the moment, they put the bottle back down and straighten to face him, “You’re catching up on years of touch starvation. You don’t have to feel bad about it.”

“I- I cannot help it. Really.” He runs his free hand through his hair, “The feeling bad, I mean.”

“So you know that you don’t need to feel bad?” Molly raises their eyebrows. That’s a hell of a step.

“Well- no. Sort of? I don’t know. I trust you when you tell me that this is normal. That this is okay.” and he squeezes Molly’s hand gently. Molly is quiet, gawping, opening and closing their mouth like a fish.

“You trust me?” they manage, at last, and Caleb smiles.

“On this, I do.”

  
Again, Molly’s smile is so bright, so wide at the idea that Caleb trusts them, Caleb can’t regret his choice. He can’t regret holding Molly’s hand. He can’t stop himself stepping in to them and kissing their cheek the way they had kissed his.   
Molly laughs, a throaty, warm laugh as Caleb draws back, and they press the fingers of their free hand to Caleb’s jaw as they push to their tiptoes to kiss his cheek right back.

“I did not realise how short you were until now.” Caleb’s smile is a smug sort of affectionate, and Molly chokes off an offended noise, drops back to look at him with a scandalised expression, their fingers still twined with his,

“I’m not short!” They protest, “I- I‘m fun-sized!”

There’s a pause, where Caleb’s face empties of everything but shock. And then fills, again, with some blend of joy and wonder and adoration and he laughs into the mid-morning, pulling Molly to him and cuddling them tight, words dying on the tip of his tongue. He continues to laugh into their shoulder, even as they pull their free arm around him, too.

“This is going to overwhelm you, you know.”

“I know.” Caleb manages through his giggles, “But I’ll take it, for now.” And turns to press his face to Molly’s neck, instead. _Molly_ is the one to shudder, now, at the oversensitivity there, but they don’t dare to ask Caleb to move.  
They feel as he grows fidgety in their grip, they feel his tension rising, and they step away from him before it can become too much, raising their joined hands and kissing Caleb’s fingers gently before they break the contact altogether. 

“Thank you.” Caleb says softly, pulling that hand to his chest and brushing his thumb over the spot Molly had kissed, almost reverent in the rhythm.

“Any time.” Molly assures, smiling up at Caleb- oh _Gods,_ they are short. _Fuck._

“We have class in an hour and a half.” Caleb tells them as he moves back to cleaning up, putting the bottles in his basket, “That is time enough to head to Clay and persuade him to make a tea for our hangovers.”

“My hangover isn’t so bad.” Molly protests. It’s really more of a dull ache behind their eyes and a nausea in their throat, not so bad as it could be. Caleb smiles crookedly.

“Clay can make it better, _ja_?” 

“Probably, yeah.” Molly winces. They’re suddenly aware of the pain, and that’s making it so much worse, “I’ll have to change into a new binder, too, this one needs washed something fierce.”

Binder… binder…

Caleb isn’t wearing his binder. And he hasn’t seen it as they cleaned, either.

“Molly? Do you know where my binder is?”

Molly grimaces as they try to remember, but nothing comes. The wine-drunk haze is too strong.

“No idea. Sorry, darling- do you have a spare?”

“No.” Caleb’s shoulders draw in his anxiety, “That- it was my only one. I couldn’t afford another, the shipping cost alone-”

“Breathe.” Molly is in front of his swimming vision, their hands hover by his but they don’t touch, which Caleb is infinitely grateful for. He takes a huge, gasping breath and sees Molly shake their head,

“No. Slowly, calmly, like this-” and they take a steady, deep breath, hold it, and let it go. Caleb copies, the next time, and the two of them breathe together until Caleb’s rabbit-hop heart rate has calmed to _restless horse_ rate instead. 

“I- _tut mir leid._ ” Caleb looks away from them, thoroughly embarrassed, and Molly gives a soft laugh, 

“I don’t know what that means.”

“It is an apology.” Caleb swallows, and it clicks a little in the quiet air.

“It’s okay.” Molly assures him softly, “It’s pretty normal to be freaked out. We’ll take another look here, then head back to the dorms, alright?”

“Okay.” Caleb shifts nervously, “But- what if we don’t find it?”

“You can’t go to class without it?” Molly’s tone is more gentle than scathing, and Caleb lets his shoulders drop,

“No.”

“Then you can stay in the dorm.” Molly shuffles around him, “I’ll ask Clay to take notes, I’ll make you a new one.”

They have their back to him, when they say this. Their tail is waving figure-eights in the air above and behind them, and Caleb reaches out to catch it so that he can- well, he considers kissing the spade tip, for a moment, but that seems… too much. It isn’t something that Molly has done, or referenced, so instead, he pulls Molly’s tail gently to his chest and wraps his fingers around it like a hug. Molly stands bolt upright near immediately, quivering as they turn over their shoulder with wide eyes.

 

“Caleb?”

He’s sort of curled around Molly’s tail, now, unsure of what he’s doing, unsure of himself, unsure of where he’s going with this.

“Are you okay?”

Caleb wants a lot. He wants to pull Molly into a hug- it feels right, now, it feels like the right thing to do. He can’t, though, he knows he can’t, he’s already on the edge of being overwhelmed.

“Why are you being so kind to me?” he manages, eyes screwed close so he doesn’t have to see Molly’s face. Doesn’t have to see the flash of pity that passes over Molly’s eyes.  
Doesn’t have to see as Molly takes a step a little closer, 

“Because I like you?” Molly tries, almost as though they’re unsure themself, “I care about you.”

“But- but why, when I was so… rude?”

Molly shrugs. And then they realise Caleb can’t see,

“I shrugged. You didn’t see, but I shrugged.”

Caleb lets out a soft, shaky breath, his fingers twitch around Molly’s tail-tip and they shift somewhat uncomfortably but say nothing. 

“Alright, sweetheart, come on. Time to go. I’ll fly us both down…”

“I cannot risk being seen.” Caleb winces, Molly’s tail held tight in his fingers, “I’ll stay here. My shirt is too thin…”

“Hold on.” Molly says, there’s a pause and a swoosh and then Caleb feels something settle around his shoulders, Molly has stepped in. When he opens his eyes, he finds them pulling their own long, ostentatious coat around him, settling it and tugging it tight with an expression of focus that Caleb finds reassuring. When they step back, their tail goes with them, and Caleb re-purposes his hands to holding Molly’s coat around his shoulders.

“Better?” Molly asks, and Caleb smiles weakly, but genuinely,

“ _Ja_ ,” he says quietly, “Better.” 

“Alright. You can just put a hand on my shoulder or something…” Molly makes a gesture to imply general touching them, and Caleb nods, holding the jacket tight.  
Then he steps in and presses to Molly’s side, one hand on the collar of the jacket holding it like a cape, the other snakes around Molly’s waist. 

“Y’sure?”

“It is not for long.” Caleb assures, “And I like it.”

This, at least, is true. He can feel the swell of worry in his throat, but he does like this. He likes being held and touched and holding and there’s a new hunger like a deep pit inside his chest, craving, wanting this, always, only fed by his own fear.

“Caleb?” Molly murmurs from somewhere near Caleb’s chin, “You’re losing yourself, there.”

“Sorry.” Caleb grimaces and pulls Molly tighter to him, “Let’s go?”

“Alright.” Molly pulls the arm holding the basket awkwardly around Caleb and focuses until the two of them are soaring their way through the air to the dorms.

 

 

 

Caleb holes up in his dorm room with Molly’s coat pulled around his shoulders.

He tries to give it back, as his friends are leaving for class, slipping into Molly’s room and holding it out and Molly takes a quick look around to make sure nobody is watching before they lean in. Quick, but gentle, they butt their head to Caleb’s in a way that reminds him of a cat’s affectionate head bump,

“Keep it for now.” They tell him quietly, “It’s probably my fault you got so drunk. I’ll get it back later.”

Caleb is stunned, silent for a moment, and then he pulls the coat around his shoulders once more.

“Thank you, Mollymauk.”

Molly flashes him a quick smile and grabs one of their satchel bags from the side,

“No problem. See you later.”

“Later.” Caleb echoes, trailing them out of their room and waving as they disappear down the corridor, he slips into his own room when they are all out of sight and sighs softly.  
Well. 

He supposes it’s about time he re-made Frumpkin.

 

 

“Molly.” Beau’s voice is the low quiet she uses when she doesn’t want to be overheard, she slinks up beside them as they move through the courtyard.

“What?” They’re preoccupied sorting their fabrics out in their bag. They’re torn between flesh-coloured and a pretty pattern for Caleb’s new binder, maybe in fishscale. The oil slick black would suit him nicely.

“What the _fuck_ was that?” Beau hisses in their ear, 

“What was _what?_ ” they look up, irritable and still a little hungover and find Beau’s expression serious and genuine. 

“With Caleb. Y’ did that little-” she mimes the headbutt, “The bump thing that y’ only do to Yasha. What the fuck is going on?”

“I- we got kinda drunk, alright? Caleb lost his binder, I feel- bad.”

“You gave him your _coat_.” Beau says flatly, “You freak when _Fjord_ touches your coat.” 

“Again,” they wave fabric scissors at her, “I feel bad.”

Beau takes a moment to study them, her face pulling into a teeth-baring grimace and her eyes narrowed.

“You’ve got a crush.”

“Wh- _no!_ ” they were _definitely_ not expecting that, they trip a little on the flagstones in their reeling horror, “I _don’t_ have a _crush_ , I feel _bad!_ Just ‘cause you don’t have a conscience doesn’t mean I don’t, Beau.”

She smacks them around the back of the head. It’s hard, this time, she’s not fucking around and it makes a _clunk_ noise, sends their scissors flying. Clay picks them up when they spin at his feet. 

“Caleb’s broken as _fuck_ an’ you’re the only one he’ll actually touch, so if you let this-” she taps their shoulder on the left side, knows they don’t like people touching near their chest, “- fuck with him any more, fuck him up any further, I will- and I mean this _genuinely_ \- kill you again and bury you myself.” 

“Beau, I don’t have a crush!” Molly throws their hands up, “I just like touching people, and Caleb- you said it yourself. He’s broken as fuck. His old place taught him some fucked up shit, and I just- I just want to help make it better.” Molly pushes their newly scissor-free hand through their hair and gives a heavy sigh. Beau eyes them again, her face impassive this time, and eventually seems to come to a conclusion.

“Right. I’ll just- whatever you say. But remember what I said, yeah? I mean it.”

“Do you _care_ about him, Beau?” Molly’s eyebrows raise for their attempt at humour. They should have expected it to fall flat. Beau scowls, 

“I mean- he’s my partner, my teammate, and- yeah. I care about him. If you try and make that into a joke, I _will_ hit you.”

“Right.” Molly concedes, they know how far to push Beau without pushing her _too_ far. 

“Did you take his measurements?” Jester slips in now that the two of them no longer seem to be at one another’s throats, and Molly curses loudly. Clay hands their scissors back down the line.

“They forgot.” He quips sagely, and Molly scowls as they put their scissors away,

“I’ll go see him at lunch.” They sulk, watching as Fjord holds the door open ahead of the group, “It’ll be alright.”

  


 

Molly breaks from the group at lunch and disappears to the dorms. Jester says she’ll save them dessert. Fjord says he’ll try and save them some rice.  
Molly likes rice.

When they knock on the dorm door lightly, there’s no response. 

“Caleb?” They call, “You alright?”

Again, there is nothing. Molly knocks again. Nothing. And they’re growing worried.

“I’m gonna come in.” They inform what could very reasonably be an empty room, and then they crack the door open.

There’s a softly breathing, Caleb-sized lump on his bed, coated in extravagant patterns and curled around something that seems to be… sort of glowing, in reverse. Not sucking in light, but smudging the world around it to a weird gray-blue.  
Molly pads quietly across the room, as soft-footed as they can, over to Caleb’s side. He’s not wearing Molly’s coat, rather, he has it laid over him like a blanket, and the grey-blue thing…   
Now that Molly is closer… 

It’s a _cat._

Caleb is curled around a magical cat, the cat is curled up in the space he’s left, and both of them appear to be asleep. Molly lets out a soft breath and sits at the top of the bed, by Caleb’s head, debates for a moment whether they should card through his hair or not. They decide against it, eventually, and shake his shoulder gently instead.

“Caleb? Dear?” They keep their voice gentle and quiet, and Caleb stirs under their hand.

He comes to with the scent of lavender strong, stronger than just Molly’s coat, and that’s why he doesn’t panic at the hand at his shoulder. Instead, still sleepy, he stretches out and scuffles just enough to rest his head on Molly’s leg, humming contentedly.

“Mollymauk,” He manages after a few moments of tired brain buzz, “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, everything’s fine.” Molly assures, squeezes Caleb’s shoulder where they’ve let their hand remain, “I just need to take some measurements from you so I can make that binder.”

That has Caleb waking, and when he sits upright, so does the cat. The cat, which yawns, making Molly’s wide eyes trail back to it.

“Frumpkin.” Caleb smiles as he spots their gaze, he lifts a hand to scratch gently at the cat’s head, “He- he is the source of most friendship I have had since I lost my- my team.” 

Molly makes a soft noise and lifts an arm, somewhere between asking and permission. Caleb sighs as he shuffles to rest underneath, Molly’s coat falls as their arm loops around his shoulders. 

“We don’t have to talk about it if it upsets you.” They tell him softly, and tilt their head to butt gently to Caleb’s.

  
“ _Nein,_ thank you. Measurements, you said?”  


“Yeah. Here,” And they stand, slip away to pull their tape measure out, “I’ll talk you through it.”


	4. Sold soon after the appraisal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly is jealous, and Fjord is in danger.

Molly works through their second set of lessons that day. They cut the fabric to precise measurements- allowing two centimetres for hemming, of course- and work carefully on pinning it together. It’s reversible, one side the oil-slick dragonscale that Molly had thought to suit Caleb so well, the other a colour that roughly matches Caleb’s skin. Not quite enough to pass as skintight on close inspection, but better than nothing.

They’re impatient to reach their sewing machine. But the lesson takes priority. 

They scribble notes between cuts, just to make sure they’re staying on task, they can multitask, they’re good.

 

Caleb lifts his head when Nott, Beau, and Jester come in. Beau huffs a sigh that could be a greeting and goes to flop down on her bed. Nott scrambles into her own with a chirpy “Hi, Caleb!”

Jester comes rushing over to Caleb and kneels beside Frumpkin. 

“A kitty!” she coos, scratching the little grey shape under his chin. Frumpkin purrs with delight, and it’s an odd sort of sound, more like water bubbling. 

“ _Ja,_ ” Caleb smiles at his cat proudly as he sits, pulling Molly’s coat around his shoulders, “His name is Frumpkin, he is my companion.” 

“He’s so _cute._ ” Jester drops to sitting, and Frumpkin jumps into her lap immediately with his boiling-water purrs.   


 

Mollymauk does not contact Caleb that evening.

  
No messages on his link, no messenger, no Molly in his room, and Caleb-   
Caleb _misses_ them. 

Gods help him, but he misses their presence. So when it gets to eleven in the evening, when Jester and Beau are asleep and Molly has not responded to the message that Caleb has left them, he stands. Nott looks up at him, 

“Everything alright?” She asks, illuminated by her little bottle of whatever she’s concocting. It’s glowing, whatever. 

“ _Ja._ ” Caleb promises as he shifts past her, “I am just going to see Mollymauk. Make sure they are alright.”

Nott nods.   
  
“Don’t be long.” She warns, and he smiles his affirmation before he heads out.

 

Molly, in their room, is sewing.  
They have been so caught up in their project that their rice and donuts from lunch go uneaten on the side and they don’t even feel it. All there is, is the plunge of the needle, the arch of the thread, and every now and then, Yasha’s kiss at the crown of their head and a glass of water she makes them take a drink from before she backs off again.

 

The only thing to break this reverie is Caleb.

 

Caleb, who comes into their room and shoots a quick look around at Clay, asleep upright in the corner, at Yasha, napping on the windowsill, at Fjord, splayed face-down on his bed.

At Molly, lit up by their sewing machine, wide-eyed and exhausted. Caleb comes to them. 

“How long have you been working on this?” He asks in a whisper, unwilling to wake his new friends. Molly looks back at the nearly-complete binder. 

“About… about ten hours?” they wince at their own answer, and Caleb pulls a face, 

“Have you eaten? Drank?” 

“No, and yes, in that order. Yasha keeps me on track for water.” And they flash a quick smile, gesturing to their rice. Caleb sighs gently and chances running a hand down their hair, dragging the backs of his fingers across the little waves and curls. Molly shivers and presses into the sensation, so Caleb does it again. 

“You should eat. And drink some more.” He says as he pauses his hand at the back of their head, rubbing his thumb into the little dip behind their ear. Their hair is soft, silky against his skin, it feels so good. 

“But it’s almost finished…” Molly drawls, eyes on the binder and Caleb takes hold of their chin with his free hand to force their eyes to him, to break the line of sight with the near-complete project. 

“There will be time for that later.” He promises, and Molly smiles a little. 

They like that.   
That’s a nice saying. 

“Time for that later.” They repeat quietly, and Caleb nods, releases their chin, pulls his hands back to himself,   
  
“I mostly came just to give you your coat back.”   
  
“I haven’t finished what I owe you, yet.” Molly stands and brushes themself down, stretches a little, “You should keep it until I do.”   
  
“ _Nein_.” Caleb is shrugging it off, offering it out, “I- as much as I love your coat, I feel… bad. And awkward. Like- like another one of those- those romantic things that I don’t really know if they are romantic, or if I have been taught odd things.”

“And this is another of those things,” Molly says gently, takes their coat, “That _can_ be romantic, but doesn’t need to be.”   
  
They swing the coat back around Caleb’s shoulders and pull it tight, pull him in for a quick hug and give a breath of a smile when he relaxes on their shoulder.   
  
“You are very stubborn, Mollymauk.”   
  
“It’s in my nature.” Molly purrs back, brushing their horn gently to Caleb’s cheek, “Butting heads.”   
  
They draw back apart, and it feels- natural. A natural end, not from awkwardness, or anxiety, or being overwhelmed.   
  
“I am going to stay until you finish eating.” Caleb tells Molly with a firm edge to his voice that they don’t question, they just sit back down and scoot over on their chair to give Caleb room to sit beside them.

 

As they eat their way through their cold rice and donuts, Caleb wonders, briefly, if he should be staying here. With Molly, tonight, to repay them for their dedication, to make sure they’re safe and he- he considers it. Really, truly considers it, to the point where Molly must hear the gears of his brain chewing themselves apart,  
  
“Copper for your thoughts, dear one?” they ask after a particularly hefty mouthful of rice, and Caleb startles up from his spot- apparently with his head on their shoulder.   
  
“I- I was just- I worry that if I leave, you will go back to working. And I do not want you to overwork yourself any more than you already have- and you _have_ already overworked, Molly, do not answer me back.”   
The last comes as Molly opens their mouth to protest. 

“Yes sir.” Molly rolls their eyes, but they’re smiling, “Here, give me your hand a second.” 

Caleb obliges almost unthinkingly, curious as to what they’re up to as they take one of his hands in both of their own and pull it up to kiss his knuckles, 

“I promise,” They say, voice solemn and low, “That if you leave, I will go straight to bed. No more working.” 

“ _Gut._ ” Caleb trusts Molly’s promises. He pulls back to mirror the knuckle kiss on their own hand, finds himself relieved. He hadn’t been confident in his ability to spend the night sober so close to someone. Someone else. Someone other than the people he’d called family before he watched them die.   
Again, almost as though Molly can read the history behind his eyes flaring up like a beacon, they half-stand and stretch up, pressing a kiss to Caleb’s forehead and somehow, some odd way, that helps to clear the clouds of smoke from collecting in his mind.

“Go to bed, Caleb.” Molly sits back down with a bump and straightens their coat around Caleb’s shoulders, “I’ll see you in the morning.”  
  
“In the morning.” Caleb agrees, and as he stands, he pauses. Molly makes a soft noise of question, and Caleb ducks back down, cupping the back of Molly’s head again for a moment before he butts his head to theirs gently, the same way that they had done to him earlier in the day.   
  
“Gute Nacht, Mollymauk.”

“Goodnight, Caleb.” They call after him in a breathless whisper as he leaves, the edges of Molly’s coat whipping out of sight behind him just before the door closes. And when it does, they sit back and sigh.  
  
“Are you sure Beau wasn’t right?” Yasha asks, and Molly startles up so hard they almost knock their chair over, catching it just a moment before it hits the floor.   
  
“How long have you been awake?”   
  
“Long enough.” Her moonlight eyes follow them as they stalk toward the bed and crawl up on their knees. She takes them into her arms in a way so practiced it comes like breathing.   
  
“Beau? Right about what?” Muffled, from against her shoulder as they settle together, and Yasha laughs. When Yasha laughs, it’s more of a breath, like a breeze, a zephyr, a noise that Molly loves dearly and would bottle it if they got the hint of a chance to do so.   
  
“About having a crush. Don’t argue or reply, it’s late.” They struggle in her arms only a moment, but they trust Yasha. They obey all of her commands, including this one, “Just… think about it.”   
Molly takes a moment to consider _that_ command. And then they nod against her shoulder, and she kisses the top of their head one more time.   
“Good.”

 

Caleb is woken by Molly the next morning, an hour before he’d usually wake for class. They’re sat at the foot of his bed with their hair ruffled and their pyjamas on- or what can be excused for pyjamas. He remembers them saying that they don’t often sleep clothed.  
  
“Caleb,” their voice is an excited whisper, “Sorry, I didn’t want to wake you… but-” they hold up a binder, tailored to Caleb’s size and completed with a zip in the side. Caleb blinks, bleary eyed, and sits up, lets Molly’s coat fall off of his shoulders where it’s been laid like a blanket. It’s a habit he’s taken to, unfortunately- it’s a very nice coat, and it smells of lavender.

“You said you would sleep.” He manages around the shape of a yawn, and Molly smiles a little wider,  
  
“I did! For a few hours, but I woke up early and couldn’t rest.”   
  
“Well,” Caleb taps his panel for the time though he doesn’t need it, “We have an hour before I get up. You should go back to sleep.”   
  
Molly deflates,   
“You don’t like the binder.” They say, soft, sad, and Caleb shakes his head,   
  
“ _Nein,_ that is not true. I like it a lot, I am just… very tired. Come on. Come here, rest with me for a while.” and he offers the corner of his quilt with sleep still hazing his eyes.   
Molly thinks about what Yasha had said.

They know she is wrong.

They don’t have feelings for Caleb, not yet- they could. There’s a potential, there, they can feel it in their chest, if they chose to nurture it. If they care for it, if they protect it, they know the seed will blossom and fill their lungs with flowers every time they see him, they know this like they know the pattern of peacock feathers curling up their neck. They also know that they could crush it, now, by leaving Caleb here and distancing themself. It would not take long to set aflame the potential in their chest, to kill it off once and for all, they could come back with nothing left there.  
  
But Caleb is rubbing at his eyes and yawning and Molly doesn’t say no.

They slip under the covers beside Caleb and smile as he pulls their own coat up over the top of the two of them, they smile as Caleb turns and curls into a sort of ball with his back to Molly’s chest and the binder laid out at the end of the bed.  
Molly, tentatively, lays an arm across his waist.   
  
“Is this alright?”   
  
“Mm. Tighter.” Caleb replies, bleary, sleepy, and he hums contentedly when Molly obliges, when they pull him closer and wrap themself around him as best they can, their face pressed to the back of his head. They don’t speak. They don’t think they could. If they tried, they’re sure that frail little seed in their chest will burst into bloom. They just hold Caleb close to them and close their eyes, eventually, it seems, falling to sleep.

 

They wake in much the same place, much the same position, with Caleb curled in a ball against their chest, with their arm around him.  
And when Caleb comes to at the sound of his alarm, his first thought is of how nice this is.

It’s not an experience he’d want daily, he doesn’t think. But it’s still nice, Molly smells of lavender and it feels right to have them here under their coat with him.  
Molly is closer to the jingling panel than Caleb is.   
  
“Mm. Molly, can you pass me my panel?” He doesn’t move from his place, but Molly does, rolls onto their back to grab Caleb’s panel and swing it over to him. Caleb silences it, shoves it under his pillow, and turns over under Molly’s arm.   
  
“ _Hallo._ ” He greets, despite Molly’s eyes still being screwed closed. They make some kind of groaning noise, and Caleb feels them tug at him harder.   
He doesn’t resist when they cuddle up to him.   
  
“We have class.” Caleb tells them cheerily, almost jauntily, “And I am not a teddy bear.”   
  
“Or Yasha.” Beau agrees, it sounds like she’s sat up behind them, on her own bed. Molly chuckles a little bit.   
  
“Five more minutes!” It comes as almost a whine, and Caleb gently pushes at Molly’s soft, soft tummy until their eyes finally open.   
  
“No more time, come on. You need to go back to your own room and get ready.”   
  
“But this is warm…” Molly squishes Caleb, “And nice!”   
  
Caleb pushes harder, until Molly falls out of bed and onto the floor with a thud, their tail a delayed few seconds behind them.

Beau fucking _loses it,_ when Caleb sits up and looks over she’s half-stripped, wearing a pair of her loose-fitting pants and down to a sports bra. She’s doubled over, too, cackling with her arms wrapped around herself like she’s trying to gather herself back in.   
Molly sits up on the floor, pouting.   
  
“Not fair!” They proclaim, “And not funny!”   
  
“It is sort of funny, _Liebling._ ” Caleb is smiling too, he leans over the edge of the bed to kiss one of their horns gently, missing how Beau’s laughter dies quickly behind him.   
Molly sighs under the affection, beaming up at him despite their earlier indignation.

“I still don’t think it is.” And Caleb rolls his eyes,  
  
“Go and get changed. I will see you soon.”   
  
“Alright,” Molly wobbles to their feet and chances a quick card through Caleb’s hair with their blunt claw-tips, “See you soon.”   
Caleb watches them leave, wiggles his fingers as they slip out of the door, and then stands himself to change.

“Caleb.” Beau says, oddly gentle, “What the fuck.”

It’s not a question, it’s just a statement, an observation, like looking at the weather.

“I like their attentions.” He shrugs right back and strips his shirt over his head. Beau rolls her eyes, Caleb grabs the binder that Molly has made from the end of his bed.

“You know that Molly ain’t like the normal standard for physical bullshit? Like, they’re _super_ touchy, a lotta people’d find it weird.”   
  
Caleb looks up, concern touching the corners of his eyes, and Beau backtracks hastily,   
  
“Not bad!” She holds her hands up, shirt balled in one fist, “Just weird? Like yeah, nobody’s gonna shout at you or get angry, ‘cause Solazone’s full o’ weirdos and we’re all fucked up and we’re all damaged. But I just- you don’t know what the _normal_ standard is,” she makes air quotes around the word _normal_ with an eyeroll, makes Caleb smile, “You don’t know. And Molly don’t either, ‘cause they ain’t that old themself- just… I thought I should tell y’. In case it bothers y’.”

Caleb is quiet for a few moments as he tugs himself into the binder, the oil slick side on the exterior. It’s pretty, well-sewn, the seams are all internal and softened over.   
  
“I don’t know.” It could be a rebuttal or an agreement, “I don’t know. But I know that I- that Mollymauk likes me,” he corrects himself before he can skip over his own words, “And I know that they enjoy the physical affection. And that they are careful of me. I think that I enjoy it, too, in certain types and amounts, and that- I don’t know. Mollymauk is patient.”   
  
“Yeah.” Beau agrees, “They don’t seem it, but Molly’s prob’ly the best, most patient o’ all of us. Save, maybe, Yasha, but Molly got a lot of their personality from her. And some from me. And some from themself.”   
  
She pulls her shirt over her head, finally,

“I’ve threatened Molly over you, so I- I guess it’s, yeah? Yeah. If you fuck with Molly, Caleb, I’ll rearrange the bones in your face.”

It’s said flat, without any heat, but it’s the cold level of it that chills up Caleb’s spine.  
  
“Acknowledged.” He says in an identical flat voice, and grabs his own shirt from his drawer.

Nott, from her bed, watches worriedly as the two of them drop into their clothes. But by the time they’ve finished, Beau is striding over Caleb’s bed to drop down beside him and run her fingers over the shoulder strap of the binder, some casually deep conversation about linings and fabric strength and stitches, like nothing has ever really happened. It’s odd, but there’s a sense of relief to her breath when she exhales. She’s glad that her boy can have this, have someone looking out for him, it means that she can rest.

 

Molly meets Caleb’s team in the hall.

They have their arm looped through Fjord’s, distracted by leaning into his shoulder and looking up at him with eyes that- and Caleb can find no other comparison- resemble the expression worn when looking at the moon. Something beautiful and incredible and incomprehensible.  
Fjord’s black eyes are blossoming nicely.

As Caleb comes out of the door- it happens so fast he might have missed it if Fjord had been a split second later in his scanning- as he comes out of the door, Fjord ducks down quickly and kisses the bridge of Molly’s nose.  
They dissolve into giggles, the sweet childish kind that Caleb doesn’t remember hearing anywhere else. They press, momentarily, closer into him and then drop away so that only their arms are linked.

“Caleb!” They almost crow, stained blush-pink and sparkling. Caleb steps fully to the hall, Molly’s coat folded over his arm and held out to them,

“Your coat.” He says, and his voice is quiet and gentle. When Molly reaches out, it isn’t for the coat, it’s for Caleb. They take his arm and pull until he comes to their other side, and then they loop their arm with his, too.

“I’m having a cuddly day.” They announce, and lean into Caleb for a moment.

Caleb manages to shock himself by turning automatically to mimic their gesture from the day before, butting his head gently, cat-like, to Molly’s and they turn wide-eyed under the touch,

“Oh.” They say softly, and feel Caleb shrug in their grip,

“Time for class.”

 

Caleb’s group splits from Molly’s as they usually do.

There’s one swap; Clay trails Caleb as he pulls out of Molly’s clinging grip, and Jester slips in next to Fjord, instead. They find, when they reach the front, that Clay has to slump across the desk and lay his head on his arms, but he doesn’t seem overly bothered by it.

Caleb leans against him, a little, just enough to feel the soft bow of layers and layers of sweater that- Caleb has learned- Clay uses to make himself look less dangerously thin and shivery.

That’s an idea he can get behind. He’s sure he’s done the same.

 

Clay falls asleep halfway through the lesson. It likely has everything to do with the dark rim visible in the thin fur around his eyes, and Caleb does not wake him. Instead, he doubles his notes on the theory and breakdown of the history of magic. They’re focusing, today, on the legend of the Heroes of Gaia, with an assignment brief for a short essay of two to five thousand words on the life of one of the heroes. The students choose which.

Caleb chooses Abel before the words are completely out of their tutor’s mouth. They have the headmaster, for this, Professor Aemenyr, who Caleb has found that he likes immensely. They have a text-to-speech function in their headset that copies a transcript of their lectures to a shared document, accessible through the network on every students’ panel.

He leans into Clay, just a little, just into the layers of sweater and he stays there. It’s warm, Clay is warm and comfortable and he smells oddly nice. Like earth and various flowers, and those flowers seem to change every time Caleb sees him.

Clay is comfortable to lean on. Dangerously so, Caleb feels his consciousness drifting off as he takes his notes for Caduceus and himself. Nott prods his thigh every now and then with her sharp, sharp claws and shocks his eyes back open. Somehow, through all of the jolting and the jumping, Clay sleeps on.

Molly watches from the back with a dim sense of jealously tingling at their fingertips, but they understand this. It’s common, they know it’s common, they develop these odd little kinds of crushes at the drop of a hat. They vividly remember the time that Bryce held a door open for them and for a good, solid week, they had laid across Yasha’s thighs mooning about how pretty their hair was.

There’s no harm in this.

Molly is skilled at nothing if not deflecting their impulses.

It takes an odd kind of self control, Yasha has mused to them on more than one occasion, to take these little- these compulsions, to touch, to hold, to love- to take them and change them into things big and bold and showy. Like flying through the air like a leaf, or like creating shirts and dresses and all those half-finished costume projects in the box under their bed that has returned, this year, worse than ever.

Molly, from an exterior view, is obnoxious and loudmouthed and has no impulse control but their friends know far better. Fjord knows how carefully Molly measures everything that they do, Beau knows how they change the flow of their power so it shoots off into nothingness and hurts nobody instead of everybody. Yasha knows how exhausting it is.

 

 

When the lesson ends, Clay sleeps on, and Caleb does not wake him. Incidentally, the reason that he does not wake him is that _he_ is not awake himself to do so, too far drifting away buried in the deep depths of the sweater pile formerly known as Caduceus Clay.

Nott does not wake Caleb, either. She scribbles a note for the two of them and checks her plans with Jester, because she trusts Jester’s judgement more than she trusts her own.

Jester presses her palms to her own cheeks, squishes them up and makes a quiet noise of awe,

“That’s _so cute._ You should _definitely_ let them sleep! Caduceus needs it, and he doesn’t like to be alone if he can help it.” 

Nott does not question. They are all damaged.

 

 

Molly seems sullen, trudging their way to the hall. Even Fjord notices.

But Fjord has more pressing matters.

The whispers are roiling in the back of his skull and he cannot ignore them much longer.

“Molly,” he whispers, and pulls at their sleeve until they come into a nook with him, hidden by walls and away from Jester’s sight. She is distracted with Nott, right now.  
Convenient for Fjord.

Molly comes, not willingly, but absently, allows themself to be pulled aside all pliant and soft under Fjord’s hands.

Once they’re securely sequestered away from sight and overhearing ears, Fjord opens his mouth, like he’s going to speak. Molly blinks, patient and waits, and Fjord’s mouth closes. And then opens again.

And then closes.

And then Molly is being pulled into a hug too desperate, too tight for Fjord, who never hugs with purpose and only with awkward resignation. (The exception, sometimes, being Jester.)  
This snaps Molly’s jealous reverie, and they wind their arms around Fjord’s back in return, squeezing as tight as they can.

“Can I ask?” They say, soft, and Fjord half shakes his head and turns to press his face to Molly’s neck, catches mostly hair.

They’re on their absolute tiptoes, despite Fjord being hunched over, he’s so much taller than they are and they stroke rhythmically into his back. They don’t know what’s wrong, he can’t seem to tell them, but they know _Fjord_ . That will have to be enough, for now.   
  
“Can you tell me what you need?” They ask, their spine aches at this tension but Fjord’s hands are shifting from their shoulders to their waist and he pulls them to him tighter, hoists them straight off the floor. Molly just… lets him. They know that they can tell him to stop, if something doesn’t sit right with them, but for now, they’re happy to play teddy bear.

 

It takes only a couple of minutes for Fjord to relax, but he doesn’t put Molly down, just loosens his iron grip.

“It’s gettin’ worse, Molly.” he huffs against Molly’s shoulder, Molly combs the dull tips of their claws through the back of Fjord’s hair affectionately,

“The voices?”  
  
“Y- yeah. Yeah, they’re… they’ve been bad,”

“I noticed, with Jester.” Molly keeps their voice soft and soothing, clinging to Fjord with one arm, stroking through his hair with the other, “You’ve been affectionate.”

“I can’t hurt her.” Fjord half-chokes, “I’ll hurt her. I can’t- not Jester.”

“Ah, but I’m fair ground?” Molly teases, drawing circles against the base of Fjord’s neck. Fjord shifts, sort of scoops Molly up a little so they’re no longer dangling loose.

“I’m not scared of you.” Molly makes out, muffled against their shoulder, “I’m not scared of hurting you. Because you don’t love me.”

“I do!” Molly argues, more relaxed now that they don’t have to hold their own body weight on the one arm, “You know I love you.”

“You don’t love me like Jessie does. You knew what I meant.”

Molly gives a soft sigh and nuzzles gently against the side of Fjord’s face, the best they can reach with his face pressed to their shoulder. They pause, their breathing soft against Fjord’s pointed ear, and then they press a gentle, terribly, terribly gentle kiss to his cheekbone.

“I know,” Molly keeps their pitch low, “But I don’t like you forgetting that I love you.”

Fjord is quiet for a while, can’t be more than a minute that he hugs Molly into him after that, but it feels like forever. Molly just leans their forehead to the side of Fjord’s head and steadies their own breathing, encouraging Fjord to imitate and he does. Calm, collected, and for the time that Molly spends there, drawing little spirals against his skull, Fjord feels… empty. The kind of empty he hasn’t felt in far too long, where the space at the back of his mind that the whispers occupy every other day is blissfully abandoned. Molly’s touch, like opposing magnetic poles, has chased it off.

When Fjord finally puts them down, Molly seals the whole affectionate lesson in with a final kiss to his jaw, the only place they can really reach from the floor.

“You’re going again, aren’t you?”

“Yeah. Not for long. A few hours, maybe.” Fjord shifts awkwardly, “‘M sorry.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Molly waves his anxieties away, “Better than Yasha’s trips! But, Fjord,” and they take hold of Fjord’s hands, pulling them up to their chest, pressed to the part by their collarbone where they know fine well he’ll feel their heartbeat, “Stay safe. Come home in one piece. Try not to fuck yourself up too much.”  
  
“I don’t always control that, Molls.”

“I know.” Molly squeezes his hands one more time, then lets go of him, stepping back, “I’ll see you later. Call for me if you need me, call Jester if you need her.”

Fjord just nods and shifts, that little kind of shift where Molly knows he’s pulling himself into the shadows to slip away. The shadows wrap around him in unnatural ways, ways beyond that of his magic, and Molly shakes their head to clear it, eyes screwed shut, and when they open again-

Fjord is gone.

They hadn’t even heard him leave.

 

Fjord is stalking around the edges of the buildings, keeping to the shadows. He doesn’t need to bend the light around him; the creature that speaks in the back of his head keeps him hidden from prying eyes, like a deflection spell. He hates this, hates leaving, hates worrying Jester and Molly but he can’t help it.

_Good._

The voice in his head hisses, louder, louder, he shakes himself to calm it down,

“Quiet, you.” He hisses right back. There’s a deep rumble, like thunder in his head, smug laughter from the creature calling Fjord’s body home.

 

And then he doesn’t remember anything, but that’s pretty common. He wakes again to his hands cut and splinters of some kind of pot shattered around him, an uneasy, sick feeling in his stomach that he only half associates with this… occurrence.

 

“What’d you make me _do?_ ” He asks, and his throat hurts something fierce, it comes out more like a rasp, barely a voice at all.

 _Not of your concern._ The slithering whisper, the roiling storm of seawater in the back of his mind replies, that same smug, smirking tone. A deep blackness pulls at the edges of his vision.

“S’of my concern if y’ hurtin’ me, or my friends.”

_Keep being a good little doll, and your friends will be fine._

“Is that a threat?” Fjord feels his face twitching into a weak snarl, he wipes his hands free of blood on the clean grass behind him,

_It is a promise, my vessel._

Fjord huffs, and then everything is welling up on him, in him, and then he turns to the side, lurches, and throws up. And _oh God,_ it burns like hell, cuts at the back of his throat meeting bile and what seems to be seawater, and new cuts opened from what seems to be- when he sees the puddle of his own mess- more fragments of the same pot. He wants to comment, wants to be angry at that voice in his head and speak of it, shout it at the top of his lungs. But he can’t, not now that the thing in his mind has threatened Molly, has threatened _Jester_ , and all he wants is to get back to them. He looks to the sky, and it’s pitch black, his panel tells him it’s coming to ten in the evening.

He hopes Jester is in her room.

“Are y’ done with me? Can I go _home_ now?”

 _You are free._ The voice says, still smug, _For now._

Fjord sighs softly, and does not reply. He slips a piece of the pot into his pocket, and begins the journey toward the nearest electrical light, dim in the distance.

 

 

It turns out to be a small village about ten minutes walk from… whatever half-wooded area he was in, and when he asks, he finds himself three and a half hours by train from Solazone, and a fifteen minute bus journey from the nearest train station.

He’s lucky, in that the buses to the nearby town of Arcton are regular- every fifteen minutes until one in the morning- seeing as Arcton is a tourist town. From there, it’s a half hour wait before his train, and he sits in the café station with a bottle of water, he doesn’t think he could keep anything else down.

Arcton is a coastal town. If Fjord leaves the building, it’s set almost on the shoreline, the sea is dark and lit in a line of pale moonlight and the idea of it makes him feel violently sick, again, his head spins and he hates that he’s grown so tired of the water when it was almost like a second home to him back in Port Emelle. He hates what this thing in his head has done to bastardise all of the lessons of Maramor, the combat prep that he and Jester had attended together.

Well.

It can tarnish his fond memories of the ocean water on his hands, his face, his tongue. It can make him hate everything he’s loved in the blue waters of the ocean and the gold sands of the beach, of the sunset on the water and the salt air on his face.

But it can never tarnish Jester.

That is the one thing he is confident he can never lose.

He almost falls asleep on the way back, exhausted and lost and all that he wants is Jester, she fills all sorts of parts of his consciousness. He can see her in images, dancing in his blurry, hurt vision, and he’s glad that both the bus driver and the train conductor ask no questions. They take his money and they leave him be, and Fjord still feels that sickness in his stomach, like a swirling, gurgling whirlpool has set up home in his throat and irritates every part of him inside.

 

 

When he gets to the station in the Solazone grounds, he presses his Link into his ear and calls Jester.

She answers almost immediately,

 _“Fjord!”_ her voice is quick and panicked, _“What happened? Are you okay?”_

 _Gods,_ Fjord has never been so happy to hear her voice. He opens his mouth to tell her that he’s fine, and then doubles over again to be sick.

When he straightens up, the world is spinny and lights are bursting in front of his eyes and he’s pretty sure the grass is green, not bright pink, why is the castle yellow?

“Uh,” he says, blinking, stumbling up toward the academy courtyard and tripping himself over grass, “No. Uh- no, no I don’t think I am. Jes’, I need you t’ come an’ get me.”

And then he collapses, face-down in the soft, damp grass under the starlit sky, with Jester calling concerned into the Link in his ear.  
He does not hear her.

 

Jester springs up and out of Fjord’s bed at top speed, she’s been sat there since the end of class, curled up and doodling and growing more and more anxious. So anxious, in fact, that Beau had come over at one point and sat behind her, Yasha had pulled her onto her lap, and the two of them had curled somewhat around her whilst she shivered with worry.  
That had eventually subsided, of course, but there was always a level of terror whenever Fjord disappeared.

She’s sure that one day, he will disappear, and he will not come back.

Yasha sits up after her,  
“Jester? Jes? Is everything alright?”

Jester is already gone, too far to reply, tripping over herself in an effort to get out.

 

She bails into the courtyard and stops under the moonlight, her breathing heavy and hair wild, eyes darting. What is it that Molly does? When they’re looking for some kind of life around them?

She closes her eyes and steadies her rushing breath, pulls it in calm and focuses on what she wants. What is it, again? Some kind of wave, like a- a- a ping. She can do that.  
Her breathing calms. She focuses hard on Fjord, on wanting to find him, and imitates Molly- she touches her forefinger and thumbtips together, and feels a sudden burst, a thin wave of force all around her.

There’s a blip, like an echo somewhere to the front and right of her and she moves for it without even bothering to think about what she’s just done, why she’s so tired, how she got here so fast.

“Fjord!” she calls, already fully aware he will not reply, “ _Fjord!_ ”

She taps her fingers together again, finds that ping, and rushes for it.

 

Fjord looks so insignificant in the grass and the moonlight, laid face-first with his hands splayed in front of him, covered in little cuts. There’s a trail of, similarly, what looks to be blood at the corner of his mouth and she throws herself down at his side.

 

“Fjord,” she says, and her voice is a choked whisper, she puts a hand to his forehead and feels the fever there, “Oh, Fjord.”

She leans down, careful, presses her hand to his cheek and begins her exploration of his hurts as she kisses his forehead, the spot where his scar sends white shocking through his hair.  
As she begins to repair him- the throat is cut again, his hands too, there’s something deeply wrong in a way that isn’t physical and she doesn’t know how to fix that- as she begins to repair Fjord from the inside out, he wakes up just a little. Blurry, bleary-eyed and confused, but awake.

“Jester?” He mumbles, like his mouth is full of cotton and horror, “S’that you? Y’okay?”

“Yes, you big dummy. Go on, go back to sleep, I’ll- I’ll carry you.”

She goes to scoop him up, and when she does, he tilts his face into her neck.

“Thank you.”

“Sleep.” She says, and laces it with the power of her command, of her magic. Fjord is too weak to resist it, he drops away in her arms.

There is no way, she thinks, that he is sleeping alone tonight. He is keeping her with him, curled at his back as she is always willing to be.  
Somewhere in the depths of Fjord’s sleep-and-sickness addled brain, he thinks that he wants to tell Jester that he loves her.  
But he doesn’t. He can’t. She has told him to go to sleep, and he does as she wishes, slips away, but not before he feels the soft splash of tears on his chin and neckerchief, where Jester’s pink glows in the little pendant he wears.

“Stupid.” He hears her say, and cannot rebuke it, “Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

 

When Fjord wakes up at the breaking of dawn the next morning, it is in his own bed. His hands are layered in bandages- thin layers, but layers all the same- and the first thought on his mind is how odd that is. Last he remembers, Jester was healing him. The hands seem pretty simple, they should have healed up with her efforts, unless-

Unless she was low on magic.

He can feel Jester, curled in a little ball against his back, the way he finds her often of late. She’s breathing in a slow rhythm, he assumes asleep, so he carefully, carefully reaches for his panel and shelters the light.

He’s met with wide red eyes as Molly stops stock still, halfway through shedding their clothes and scrubbing their face clean of tears,

“Did I wake you?” They whisper, and Fjord tries to say _no_ but his throat, _Gods_ , he’s fucked that up something fierce. He shakes his head minutely instead and Molly’s face softens a little,   
  
“Good. I’ll speak with… to you in the morning. I have some problems with… this.” and they gesture at Fjord’s hands, turn away, and continue stripping. Fjord’s attention is back on his panel when they clamber into bed, he scrolls through his contacts and finds Jester’s detail pane.

 

 _Holy_ shit.

 

Either Fjord was almost dead when she found him and all of that energy had gone into making him _not_ dead, or there’s some other weird thing going on because even now, Jester is running at about forty-five percent of her usual, healthy magic level. And she’s been resting for a while.  
He dims the panel screen and puts it back on his bedside table, turns over in his covers. Jester has burrito’d him in, wrapped the quilt around him rather than under her, keeping him warm even though the wrap has mostly loosened.  
He does the only thing he can really think of doing, his mind is tired and he still feels sick and he slips quietly out of bed, out of the covers, and settles the quilt across Jester, across his own side of the little bed, and crawls back under with her.

Jester does not stir. She must be exhausted, he knows that she would usually wake at the drop of a feather when it comes to his safety, and feels another rush of affection for her. It is not the first. He knows that he loves her.

He wants, he thinks, to wake her. To let her know that he’s making this decision awake and alert.

He does not.

He just… crawls and curls around her, pulls an arm around her waist and holds her against him as tight as he dares.  
Fjord falls back to sleep in the dim dawn light, scattering gentle kisses across the top of Jester’s head.

She sleeps on, unaware.


	5. The hammer struck the auction table

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clay's in danger, Molly's in danger, Fjord's in danger, Jester isn't.  
> Yet.

Jester does not wake up in the morning.

When all of their alarms go off, and they all pull themselves up, Jester sleeps on.  
Clay comes wandering over, still dressed in the loose sheet shirt he calls sleepwear, there is a frown on his face.  
Fjord has never seen Clay frown outside of a breakdown.

“What happened last night? I was asleep when you came back.”

“I… don’t really know.” Fjord answers, voice still that terrible rasp, and it’s mostly the truth, “I passed out in th’ grass out front, an’ at some point, Jes must’ve found me. But she’s runnin’ real low on magic levels, th’ kinda low that’d only come from a rez, or from overexertion. I don’t _think_ I died.”

Clay hums gently,

“Best leave her to sleep. She did the same for me, yesterday, I’ll take some notes if I need to.”

“It’s all phys-com today,”  Yasha tells the two of them from her bed, where she’s sat upright and Molly is scuffling their way into their combat outfit, “No notes, we’ll just catch her up later.”

“Right.” Clay pats Fjord’s shoulder and wanders off to change into his own beetle armor.

 

Fjord is the last out of the room.  
Molly pauses at the door, looking over their shoulder,

“You ready?”

“Just a minute.” Fjord tells them, and they nod, close the door behind them as they slip out and give him the privacy he wants.

He crouches beside Jester, brushes the loose bits of hair back from her face and leans in. Gently, mindful of his still-re-growing tusks, he kisses the bridge of her nose. Her hair is soft under his fingertips, and if it meant she’d be safe, he’d stay here forever.

“Love you, Jes.” He whispers, terrified that she’ll hear him.

Of course, she does not. She sleeps on, not even stirring, and Fjord swallows the taste of guilt and seawater at the back of his throat.

 

Phys-com, Physical Combat, ends up being a mostly unsupervised lesson in the training wildgrounds of the forest edge behind the main building. Eris-Luna lounges idly on the side, sipping from a juice box- of which she has six- and wiggling a pair of sunglasses that she absolutely doesn’t need to wear in this weather and weak sun.

 

Phys-com is always a clusterfuck. This, Fjord knows, but he goes in all guns blazing and comes up against Caleb in magicless hand-to-hand.

“I thought that Jester would be with you.” Caleb pants as he ducks out of the way of a sharp, darting blow, a brief grin on his face as he whirls around Fjord. Fucker must have been taking lessons from Molly.

“No, she, uh- there was an incident, last night-”

“Molly mentioned something,” Caleb quips, “Go on.”

“Yeah, so I came home either half dead or entirely dead, an’ Jester fixed me up, but fucked her magic in the meantime. She’s jus’ restin’ at home, righ’ now.”

“In your room, you mean?” Caleb artfully parries another darting blow, Fjord’s fist going wide and he counters with another jab that catches Fjord’s shoulder. Thankfully, Caleb is too small to hurt much.

“Yeah,” Fjord goes for a leg sweep that Caleb trips over, but manages to stay upright, “My room. She doesn’t usually spend this much time with me, I swear.”

“I can see why she does,” Caleb half-shrugs, aims a kick at Fjord’s shin and laughs when he yelps in pain, “You’re very handsome.”

And then he yanks Fjord’s feet right out from under him, figuratively _and_ literally, his head knocks the floor as he goes down hard and lights burst in front of his eyes. Caleb whoops a little and offers his hands to him,

“It is not exactly fair,” Caleb says, amusement in his tone, “To defeat a man so beaten up.”

“An’ here I was thinkin’ you’d be an opportunist.” Fjord gives Caleb a sharp grin and hint of regrowing tusk, takes his hands and lets the smaller man help haul him to his feet. Caleb gives a brief bark of laughter and punches Fjord’s arm jovially, hissing in pain and shaking his fist when he does,

“I am only an opportunist when it does no harm to those I care for.”

“Ah, you care about me? Already, Caleb? You’re softer than I thought.”

“Well, _nein,_ not you. I could, given time, perhaps, but you haven’t given me much to go on yet.” Caleb raises his eyebrows, “Molly, however…”

“And we all thought y’ hated them.” Fjord gives another bit of a sharp grin, and Caleb eyes the hint of tusk,

“Do you mind if I ask, about your tusks? You’re under no obligation to tell me, of course, I’m merely curious.”

“No, I- uh- you’re one of us now, right? It’s not much of a story, ‘m afraid, jus’ some childhood bullyin’ and a complex that never quite gave way. Jester keeps tryna assure me she likes them, but- uh- I still pick, sometimes.”

“Well, I think I’d have to agree with Jester, I- ah… I think that they suit you.” Caleb tells him, busy sweeping his hands over Fjord’s arms and shoulders in search of injury, assuring himself the half-orc is fit to spar, “You are handsome without, and you would be handsome with.”

Fjord blushes a little. Barely noticeable, brown against the green of his skin, but there regardless and Caleb quirks a smile.

“You are not complimented much, hm?”

“Outside o’ Jester an’ Molly? No. I- uh- I’m not.”

“Are they not enough? Do you not trust their word?”

“Molly’d fuck a peacock were it able to give full an’ informed consent,” Fjord rattles off on impulse alone, makes Caleb bark a laugh, “An’ Jester- well, have y’ ever been in love, Caleb?”

A flicker of concern colours Caleb’s eyes.

“No.” He says quietly. There is hurt in his voice.

“It blinds y’, Caleb, to people’s faults. Y’ love, and y’ find the bad parts of a person an’ convince yourself you love those too. Sometimes they’re bad habits, like nose-pickin’, or nail-bitin’, and they ain’t so bad to love. But sometimes, you can get yourself so deep into this headspace that y’ see things that ain’t there, feel things y’ain’t really feelin’, and it’s fuckin’ hard to keep y’ head above water an’ see the light.”

“You are not talking about your looks anymore, are you?”

There’s a pause, a heavy, weighted pause with hurt and regret in every silenced syllable, the background of fighting noise a perfect fit for the feeling,

“No. I ain’t, there’s- there’s somethin’ wrong with me, Caleb, an’ Jester loves me too much to really see it. Now, she’s doin’ a decent job of keepin’ her head above water, an’ I’m proud o’ that. But that doesn’t mean she don’t drown sometimes, a li’l bit.”

“Fjord, what you are saying makes- makes no sense.” Caleb says, even as it begins to make perfect sense to him, “You- ah- what could possibly be in you that makes you believe you are unworthy of her love?”

“You don’ know me, Caleb,” Fjord shifts back into a combat stance and Caleb, reluctantly, mirrors, “There’s- I got problems, alright, things I ain’t comfortable tellin’ you.”

“You don’t need to.” Caleb placates, dropping his pose a moment to set a hand to the back of Fjord’s own, “Not now, not ever if you do not wish to. I can’t say anything to placate you. Knowing I can’t help- it- it hurts.”

Fjord huffs and takes a very, very brief look around, ensuring all eyes are off of them. Eris-Luna has disappeared from her seat, shades and juice boxes abandoned, and their classmates are distracted, so he turns back,

“Molly’s been teachin’ you about physical contact, yeah?”

“ _Ja,_ they’re very good at what they do.” Caleb says, “Why?”

“I’m not, yeah, I don’t usually like it. ‘Cept from Molly. Sometimes Jester. But Molly’s- they’re a fuckin’ influence, so my impulse right now is- well- I feel like I hurt y’ indirectly, an’ I wanna hug y’.”

Caleb, for a moment, is quiet and wide-eyed.  
And then he takes a quick step in.

He doesn’t hug Fjord so much as walk right into him and thunk his head to Fjord’s shoulder, finds one awkward arm coming around his shoulders and holding, very loosely, a few seconds and then Caleb steps back again, shaking out of Fjord’s loose grip.

“Back to beating the shit out of one another, _ja?_ ”

“Yeah. After you.”

 

Molly ends up against Clay.

Clay is not exactly adept at hand-to-hand, and Molly wants to take it easy on him.  
They do.  
But after they catch and pin his arm for the third time and drive him to his knees yelping in pain, they drop back and push their face into their hands.

“Deuces, I’m gonna break your fingers if we keep going.” They say, muffled through their palms. They’re exhausted and want to cry and so much is _wrong_ and it’s nothing at all but it feels insurmountable.

Clay sets a hand to his own aching arm and begins his green-blue healing glow, frowning,

“You’re the master of your own boundaries, Molly, come on.”

“No, you’re misunderstanding,” Molly lifts their head, eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot and there’s something like tears at the corners, a terrifying snarl on their face, “It won’t be accidental.”

Clay startles a little,

“Mollymauk,” He gathers that slow, fierce sense of intimidation into himself, “I’m sure you don’t mean whatever harm you’re threatening, and that there’s something else going on. But please know I don’t wish to hurt you, and I absolutely will if you force my hand to it.”

The only warning he gets is a little growl before Molly is launching at him and he swears to himself in the language of the fae, ducking as quick as he can from their darting blow. Well, if all etiquette is off of the table,

“I gave you warning.” He tells Molly loudly, enough to be overheard, and stamps hard. From the ground sprouts a wall of brambles to separate them and he hears Molly cursing in Hellsvit on the other side and the whizz of a scimitar.

If weapons are on the table, too, then Clay has no qualms pulling his staff from the strap on his back and running his fingers across the six crystals he has loaded. He has choices. He has options. He just needs to keep this going until someone intervenes.

Clay knows he is stronger than Molly.

He just really doesn’t want to hurt them.

As the first section of bramble wall begins to collapse, Clay bangs the staff on the ground and looses a wave of green-blue across the floor, shockwaving into the air and he breathes, focuses on his call for aid and watches as the swarm of bugs, beetles, worms, all sorts of critters begin to coalesce, rising from the ground and crowding Molly, making them smack as they carve through,

“You can’t do this to me, I’ll- ack!” Molly coughs as a fly gets sucked into their throat and Clay just gives them the sagest, most terrifying smile he can muster,

“I don’t wish to hurt you, Mollymauk.”

And then there’s a flash as Clay activates one of his crystals.

And then he is _gone._ No shadow-imprint left behind, just gone one split-second to the next and Molly, through the haze of bugs and bites and brambles spots the footsteps and grass bowing and hears their classmates calling, begging for an end.

 

They’ll give them an end.

 

It’s calculated and feinting and Clay doesn’t see the scimitar coming until it’s slicing through the layers of cloth between his leather armor, where the plates don’t quite meet at his hip and the invisibility drops as the scimitar comes out and Molly aims for a second, more direct, more destructive hit-

A burst of flame rages in that split-second of space and Molly yelps, jumping back from the fire raging inches from their face, their scimitar clattering to the ground.

When the fire clears, Caleb stands in front of them, hair stuck to his forehead with sweat, panting, shoulders drawn and fists clenched, body between Molly and Clay and glaring at Molly with-  
With hatred.

Disgust.

Betrayal.

All of whatever this had been- rage, jealousy, sleepless nights and hurt- it all drains away like a lanced ulcer and Molly is left nursing burns on their hands and singed hair, wide-eyed as Caleb steps toward them once, twice,

“Caleb!” Fjord’s warning comes too late for either of them,

“Tongue behind your teeth, Mollymauk.” is all they get before Caleb clocks them so hard with a sideswipe that they’re unconscious before they hit the ground.

 

Fjord deals with Molly. Caleb rushes to Clay’s side, hand hard over his wound putting pressure and brushing long pink hair away from the damp fur of his forehead,

“ _Mein Gott,_ Caduceus, are you- well, you’re very obviously not alright.” Caleb has to stretch to push the heel of his hand to the wound whilst his fingers find Clay’s hair. That hand- the one he’d punched Molly with- it’s definitely fucked. Broken, most likely, Caleb had known the dangers of striking jaw this way but he’d done it anyhow. He’d seen Molly stab Clay. He’d seen the blade come out covered in crimson. His hand will heal.  
Caduceus is trying not to writhe under him, but Caleb can feel the restraint, can feel the warmth and spike of pain as Clay lays a hand gently over Caleb’s broken one,

“You- your hand-”

“ _Ja,_ because I am the one we should be worried about.” Caleb rolls his eyes, he can feel Clay healing him as he speaks. Gods above, he’d sooner bleed out than let Caleb hurt a little, “ _Nein,_ Caduceus, focus on yourself. I can wait. You cannot.”

He’d shake Clay’s hand off if he wasn’t putting pressure on the still-bleeding wound, and Clay gives a pained little groan as he pushes his fingers to his own side and begins knitting himself back together. Caleb murmurs in his mother tongue, some faint placations and well-wishing and apologies.  
He should have seen something like this coming earlier, with Molly on the tower top in his arms sobbing, with Molly wound around him like ivy crying into his neck and telling him horrible things about where they’d come from. With Molly’s pretty eyes on his and his hand in their hair and their breath warm and mingling with his and to think for a split second, Caleb had considered that he may be able to fall for them.

 He came into this too hard, too fast, Molly had tried to gather his attention and affection and that sense of the physical that Caleb craved so long was such a lure that he had blinded himself.

As Fjord had said. _  
_ _You can get yourself so deep into this headspace that y’ see things that ain’t there, feel things y’ain’t really feelin’._

He will not make this mistake again.

“Beauregard!” He calls across the crowd, knowing she will hear, knowing she will come and she does, a burst of blue in his vision with a worried line setting her mouth, a frown on her brows,

“Is he alright?” She gestures to Clay, who has gone quiet now, the healing ripples have stopped and it seems that he’s passed out. Caleb is no longer worried, the wound is no longer bleeding, his fingers do not stop carding through his hair,

“Ah, _ja,_ I think so. Or he will be. But he is not sharing a room with that purple one tonight, will you adjust the gravity so that I can carry him?”

“Uh- I could just carry him, if y’ want?” Beau frowns at Caleb’s quick voice and stuttering eyeline as he looks everywhere but her, and he tugs Clay as if to pull him closer. It doesn’t work, with one hand broken and the other in his hair, but it has the same effect,

“I would like to carry him myself.”

“Your hand is _super_ fucked, Caleb. At least let me come with.”

He can concede to that, he supposes, and nods. She sets her hands to Clay and looses a burst of blue through him, and from there he’s light as anything to pick up. The crowd parts for Caleb when he stands, like an ocean splitting itself for a master.  
He looks over his shoulder to where Yasha and Fjord are carefully fussing over Molly.

“You keep them away from me. Away from us, tonight, do you understand?”

Fjord looks up and the hurt in his eyes almost makes Caleb soften.  
Almost.

“Do you understand, Fjord?” he repeats, and the hurt hardens into something else,

“I gotcha. Loud an’ fuckin’ clear.” He replies, tone cold, and turns back to Molly.

Beau follows Caleb through the red sea of students staring dumbly at this scrawny little twenty-year-old with social anxiety as he carries Caduceus Clay away and takes him home.

 

Beau sits on her own bed and watches Caleb mutely as he tucks a series of blankets around Clay and sits up behind him, pressed gently to his sleeping form. Beau has bound his hand in her own blue bandaging, for now, until someone can heal it properly. It aches, but Clay seems to have stopped the bones being terribly broken, at least.

“Didn’t realise y’ cared about Clay so much.” Beau comments as he scuffles into place, tries to sound uninterested and fails badly. Caleb frowns a little and leans into Clay, somewhat curled around his top half to see Beau properly, 

“ _Ja,_ the first night I spent here, he made tea with me. I have not felt a natural connection to anyone on such a level in a long while.”

As he speaks, he finds his hands automatically moving to smooth Clay’s hair back, testing for a fever. He has one, unsurprisingly. Caleb makes a mental note to learn how to heal.

“I warned you not t’ fuck with Molly.” Beau points at him, and Caleb frowns, feels the hint of a sneer trying to come out but he battles it back,

“I have done nothing to them. They quite literally stabbed Caduceus.”

Beau’s face goes through the five stages of grief in turn. When she reaches acceptance, she stands suddenly and makes for the door,

“I’m going to check on Jester.” She says, voice sharp, “As Clay once said, sleep well with your bad decisions.”

She leaves, and Caleb sighs softly as he curls up behind Clay in just the right place to have his finger tips curled in the ends of his pink hair.

 

With both healers out of commission from the teams, there is no recompense for Molly’s sins.

 

Jester wakes up in the mid evening to Fjord cuddling her.

Actually cuddling her, she’s pulled up with her head on his chest and his arms around her are firm, not tight, he has his cheek to the top of her head and the rhythm of his thumb against her thigh tells her he’s awake. He’s choosing to do this. When she wriggles, his grip loosens, but he does not let go.

“Jes,” he whispers, like his voice is sticking in his throat, “Oh, Jester, you’re awake. Thank the Gods. Holy shit.”

If it wasn’t for the company of the room, Fjord knows he would have kissed her.  
But Beau, Molly, and Yasha have all sat up on the fake double bed to look over in concern and he must save his affections for later.

“You’re cuddling me.” She murmurs, still groggy, and his smile is pained but genuine,

“Yeah. You gave me a fuckin’ scare, Jes, you’ve been asleep almost a whole day.”

She snuggles closer and he can’t help sighing relief that he can tighten his grip, his arms wind around her and he pulls her as close as he dares to.  
Jester always seems to smell of the sea, a brisk salt and the idea of sand underfoot, of damp wood rotting with salt in its crevices, trying to preserve what it can and he holds her tight.

She is the one thing he can never lose.

This thing in the back of his mind can take everything from him. His blood, his control, his strength, his love of the ocean and the feeling of ocean spray on his face over the bow of a ship but it cannot take Jester.  
The words _I love you_ dance on his tongue as they do so often with her but he doesn’t speak, and neither do any of their friends. They watch in silence as Fjord cuddles tighter, tighter every passing second. They watch when he begins to shake.

They stop watching,

“I think we should go to the canteen,” Molly says, voice low, “See if they have any food. Jester will be hungry, and… yeah.”

He receives murmurs of agreement from the girls and the three of them shuffle out, Molly still in their pyjamas and Yasha’s hair half braided, leaving behind quiet thanks to the Gods above that Jester is awake.

“Jes. Jessie, Jester, Jes,” Fjord murmurs, as soon as the door is closed, “ _Gods,_ I thought you were gone, for a while, when y’ didn’t wake up. I thought I’d lost you.”

“Not me.” She mumbles back, a little slurred by the cheek pressed to his chest, and he squeezes her one last time before he loosens his grip and hears her give a soft noise of disappointment.

It does not last long. As she goes to sit up, Fjord feels his iron resolve slip away from him for just, just, _just_ long enough to press one hand to her cheek and pull her back down and-

 

And he kisses her.

 

That’s the mistake he makes.  
He knows it’s a mistake. He knows he can’t love her the way he does. He can’t give her everything she wants and deserves. They’ve talked about it.  
But there’s something perfect and intoxicating about the way she presses back against him, about the way she fits perfectly into the crook of his arm, about how soft she is.

About how much he adores her.

But he still can’t say it out loud, and he does the next best thing and mouths the words into the kiss. He knows how smart she is. If the hand on his hip tightening its grip to vice-point says anything, it’s that she understands.  
She’s reaching for breath when they draw apart, resting her forehead to his- mindful of the horns- eyes closed and breathing shallow,

“I love you too.” Are the first words out of her mouth and Fjord’s fingers twitch against her back, she follows it up with, “And your tusks are growing back! Aw!”

He laughs a little, a soft chuckle more than anything else and she smiles, too,

“You’re a ray of fuckin’ sunshine, Jester.”

“I hope you mean that, because I am.” He can hear the pout and he smiles, he wants to kiss her again so badly it hurts but he can’t,   
  
“I mean it.” He says sincerely, and there’s a few long seconds of silence in speaking, the only noise the soft inhale and exhale, half-panting. She drops back against his chest and lays her head on his shoulder,

“Nothing’s different, is it?” It sounds more of an assumption than a question, and he pulls his arms around her loosely,

“I wish it could be. One day it will.”

“Is that a promise?” And she lifts her head to meet his eyes.

He kisses her again.

“I promise,” He says, presses the vow against her mouth and locks it in place. He cannot break this oath. He will not break this oath.

They can never take Jester from him.

  


Caleb sleeps a lot, Nott has noted.

They all sleep a lot, but Caleb could sleep for days on end if there was no reason to wake, he curls against Clay’s back and sleeps like he belongs there. She suspects he’d be pressed closer if he had the nerve, the way he did with Molly only the day before, but he seems content where he is. The ends of Clay’s hair are tangled around his fingers.

She’d crept over to Clay at one point, just to lay her hands gently over the wound and fix what little Clay hadn’t in the time he’d been conscious, and she plans to fix Caleb’s hand properly when he wakes up.  
She could do it now, his right hand rests on Clay’s shoulder, but she doesn’t want to risk waking or shocking him, or Clay, they both deserve their rest. The daylight is slowly fading, outside, and she will have to wake them soon, just to eat. It’s been a hell of a day.

 

Caleb wakes up just as the light of the day is disappearing and Nott is flicking on the switch. It is only the three of them in the room.

“Where is Beauregard? Jester? Is Jester okay?”

“She woke up a little while ago, she’s having some alone time with Fjord.” Nott gives him a quick smile, “Beau went for food, for when you and Jester and Clay woke up. They dropped in just before they left.”

Caleb nods as he sits, hissing in pain when he moves his right hand from Clay’s shoulder and Nott startles and scuttles from her bed to his side to take hold of it. He hisses again, and she makes soft, soothing sounds as she ripples her healing power into him, righting bones and fixing bruised flesh. When she’s done, he flexes his fingers experimentally and hums to find that the pain has all but disappeared. He works on unwrapping Beau’s bandages as she moves back to her own bed.

Clay sleeps on.

Caleb puts a hand gently to his forehead to feel for his temperature, and when he’s satisfied that he no longer has a fever, he slips out of bed.

“Nott,” He says softly, “Can you care for Clay? Make sure nothing else happens to him?”

“Of course, Caleb, where are you going?”

Caleb considers lying to her, telling her that he’s going for food, but he doesn’t want to lie. He doesn’t want to tell her the truth either.

“Out.” He gives in response instead, and slips away before she can question him.

 

Six days.

 

Caleb’s been here six days and he’s already the catalyst for everything wrong.

He doesn’t notice himself traipsing up the stairs until he reaches the top of the tower and finds it empty, finds himself almost painfully disappointed and comes to the edge of the balcony, staring out over the grounds of Soltryce and the distant lights miles beyond. The nearest city is too far for his eye to catch, but he looks in that general direction anyway.  
And he sighs, slumping across the wall and dropping his eyes to the space below, the empty expanse of air that calls for him and he wants to crawl to it, to fall to it, but his bones feel leaden.

 

Molly is much the same.

 

On the other side of the tower, stood on the thin ridge of wall with their back to stone and a release ahead of them and it would only be fair. It would be doing what’s right, they reason, when they can never truly control when their temper will flare the way it has, when the life before their own keeps rearing its head in riddled scar tissue over barely-healed wounds, opening back up.  
They’d spent hours up here with Caleb the night before, this morning, curled around him ivy-tight crying and Caleb had sat and listened and stroked through their hair and kissed their forehead and cheeks, promising them that they’re alright, they’re alive.

They’d spent time telling Caleb almost all they know. About the first time the husks had come, about Lucien, the man that came before Molly, about the gravesite that Lucien’s _friends_ had put him in, a dull attempt to keep a grievously wounded man safe.  
They had told Caleb about Cree. One of the only things he properly remembers from Lucien, can remember his distaste, can remember her loyalty. Lucien had known that she loved him and used that against her. Hurting her in ways that they cannot comprehend. Thank all of the Gods that he’d died along with her magic.

They hadn’t told Caleb how Lucien’s insatiable bloodlust and rage finds its way into their lungs sometimes. How they forget, how the world blurs between Lucien and Mollymauk. They didn’t want to scare him too much, what they’d said was enough.

They should have told him.

They should never hurt anyone again.

They don’t realise that they’re crying until the world blurs away, and they don’t hear Caleb on the other side considering the exact same thing that they are.

 

Molly and Caleb don’t talk at all for a week after that.

 

Caleb goes back to the dorm, scrubbing tears from his cheeks, comes in at one in the morning to find Nott and Clay both sleeping, Clay has managed to turn over onto his bad side, his back to the door. Caleb goes for Jester’s bed before his own, but as he passes Clay, he sees an ear twitch.

“Caleb?” Clay says quietly, and Caleb looks over to him so fast his head spins,

“I thought that you were asleep.”

“I’m naturally perceptive. Are you okay?”

Caleb sighs and rubs at his eyes again,

“I’m an idiot, Caduceus,” he relents, he trusts Clay in this moment, “I thought that Mollymauk could be trusted. I thought I liked them.”

“You do.” Clay says gently, and pats the bed beside himself. Caleb, coming to sit beside him, shakes his head vehemently,

“ _Nein,_ I saw what they did today. I don’t need an excuse of why, nothing can excuse that.”

“There are things.” Clay’s tone is sage, “I’ve already forgiven them for it.”

“How?” Caleb’s voice shakes with the force of his disbelief, “They _stabbed_ you, and they would have done worse had I not stepped in.”

“Yeah, probably. You probably saved my life. Thank you, but I still don’t hold blame to them.”

“ _Why?_ ” Caleb throws his hands up, and Clay pats the bed again,

“Lie down and I’ll tell you.”

Caleb likes having someone in his bed. He likes to know he’s not alone anymore. So he stands and changes and settles back down beside Clay, still worked up and worried and he finds Clay’s hand offered to him between them.  
Caleb takes it. Or at least, he lays his hand in Clay’s far larger one and they stay still, quiet for a few moments,

“Molly isn’t always in control of themself and their actions.” Clay tells Caleb quietly, “Do you know what happened to them?”

“About the grave? They have told me, _ja._ ”

“Did they tell you how rude and horrible Lucien was? About Cree? About the murders?”

“They- ah- they told me about Cree, but-”

“Lucien was terrible, Caleb. And somewhere, there’s still memories of him locked in their mind, though they’re separate people. Completely, Lucien was a Blood Mage, Molly is Air. But bits of Lucien’s memories and personalities, they come through when Molly is least expecting it, usually when they’ve had something trigger their past traumas.”

Like talking about it.

Fuck.

This really is all Caleb’s fault.

“They still stabbed you,” Caleb says fiercely, “I can’t forgive them for that.”

“You might not be able to, but I can. I think you might, in time.”

“ _Nein,_ ” says Caleb, through a yawn, and Clay’s breath comes in a huff of laughter,

“Go to sleep. There’s no classes tomorrow, you can sleep in.”

“And you?”

“I’m going nowhere.” Clay promises, curling his fingers very briefly around Caleb’s hand and releasing again, “Go to sleep.”

 

Caleb, in sheer paranoia, keeps Clay at his side near-constantly for three days. Clay doesn’t mind so much, Caleb is good company, and disappears when Clay finds he’d like to do something more private, like take a bath, or go to the bathroom. He returns to Caleb’s bed at night, the creak of the wood underneath him loud enough to wake the dead but Caleb gets cuddly when he’s sleepy and by the Gods, he’s territorially defensive

The first time that Molly looks as though they might come toward Clay, Caleb puts himself between them physically and leans against his side, prompting Clay to look down in mild shock, pause, and then ruffle Caleb’s hair gently. Molly’s step stalls, turns, and they walk back to Fjord’s side.

 

They say nothing to one another for a week.

And then on a Friday evening, with the days lengthening and the weather growing warmer, the two of them end up at the tower together.  
Caleb sees Molly coming, but he refuses to move. Refuses to care. He just slips a little further to one side and lets Molly set down on the other.  
They’re both silent for a while, maybe half an hour, staring out across the tops of the trees and the fields,

“Caleb,” Molly says, nervous, shaking,

“No.” Caleb replies, turns on his heel, and walks away.

 

Molly pulls Fjord aside in the hallway, as he walks past alone, yanks him into a crevice and presses into him. Not crying, not sobbing, but shaking and Fjord strokes their hair gently,

“It’s alright, Molly, it’s okay.”

Molly does not give words of response, they just lift their arms as far around Fjord’s neck as they can and Fjord sighs, picks them from the floor so that they can press their face to his neck.

“You’re bein’ a goddamn idiot, you know that?” Fjord says, holding them as tight as he’ll let himself and Molly doesn’t reply. Fjord can feel them nuzzling against his neck, the odd light kiss and shakes his head gently.

“An idiot.” he repeats, but doesn’t let them go. He loves them too much to do that.

 

It’s not like life stops when Molly and Caleb aren’t talking. It goes on, painfully, but it goes on, Molly walks something like a ghost when they’re alone.  
Yasha cuddles them in close in the evenings and sometimes, for a few hours, at least, it feels like everything is okay.  
Yasha kisses the top of their head,

“You know none of us blame you.” She says quietly, and they snuggle in closer to her,

“I know you don’t, just-”

“Hey,” Beau leans over from Yasha’s other side, draped across her torso, “You got us, right? Same as y’ did last year, an’ you were just fine. Why’s Caleb so important?”

Molly frowns and avoids looking at her, trying to find an answer that isn’t the one they know is the truth, swallowing nervously.

“Well?” She presses, and Molly sighs, looks up to meet her eyes,

“You know why.”

Beau’s half-scowl evaporates into wide-eyed surprise. She’s never known Molly to give their secrets up this way, even Yasha seems shocked when Beau looks briefly to meet her eyes,

“Ah.” Yasha says,

“Right.” Beau layers over the top, and then she’s scrambling over Yasha a little bit to lie on the other side of Molly, pressing them between the two girls.

“Beau?” Molly asks tentatively, and receives a gentle elbow to the ribs in reply,

“Mention it to anyone _literally_ ever and I swear to the Gods I’ll beat you so hard that Lucien won’t recognise his own face in the afterlife.” and she tucks her face under their horn, they feel the soft puff of her breath against their neck and smile,

“Thank you.”

 

Caleb lets Clay go back to his own room after three more nights of keeping him close. And by _lets,_ it’s more along the line of insists, because Clay would never be impolite enough to tell Caleb he wants his own space but Caleb can understand enough for that.

It doesn’t stop him going in every few days, when he knows nobody else is there.

Clay isn’t so much a fan of getting changed in front of the others, even his team, but he doesn’t so much mind Caleb- in fact, after Caleb walks in the first time quite accidentally, it becomes almost routine for him to drop in whilst Clay is changing.

 

Two weeks after Molly’s episode, Caleb slips into the other team’s room at just the right moment to find Clay unbuckling his beetle armor from the combat training earlier that day, tucking it under his bed.

“Hey, Caleb,” he greets in his slow, languid voice, a sort of smile under his still-tired eyes, “Everything alright?”

“Ah, _ja,_ I came to-” he comes wandering to Clay’s bed, momentarily silenced as Clay pulls his under-armor padding shirt over his head and Caleb gets a brief flash of what he’s here to check on.

Clay sets the shirt down as Caleb drops to a crouch at the edge of the bed, he finds one of Clay’s hands on his head semi-automatically and lifts his head to lock eyes with him,

“What- uh- why’re you on your knees, there?” Clay says, nerves evident in his stuttering tone and wide eyes, Caleb gives a brief smile,

“I- ah- I just want to check the scar.” He puts a hand gently to Clay’s knee, “I can move, if this makes you uncomfortable?”

“I’d prefer that, yeah, I’m not the biggest fan of seeing you there. Here,” he pats the bed beside himself, and Caleb shifts up to sit there. After a momentary pause, seeking silent consent, he reaches out to Clay’s hip and lifts the edge of his thin shirt, the one that looks almost as though it has been weaved from spider-silk.

The scar looks more like a month or two old than the two weeks, much thanks to the magical healing, but it still breaks the pattern of soft, short blue fur across Clay’s body with the slight raised pink line and Caleb brushes his thumb across it. Clay muffles a sharp inhale, and Caleb settles for resting his palm across it instead, his hand only just big enough to cover the whole thing, he leans against Clay’s shoulder in a way that has become familiar in the past couple of weeks.

He’s measuring himself out carefully, now. There’s no clinging or kissing or hand-holding, fewer hugs, but he knows that with Clay, at least, he can lean on him sometimes. And he could fall asleep here, if he was so inclined, and he is tempted- Clay is warm, and though he’s mostly bone, so is Caleb, he doesn’t mind. He can feel the sharp jut of Clay’s hipbone under his fingers with his hand here, and Clay has a hand gently resting on Caleb’s own anyway, it’s more of an exchange of information.

“You were cleared to be back on the field, _ja?_ I don’t want to hear that you’re pushing yourself too hard.”

“Eris-Luna said I’m good to go.” Clay assures, squeezing Caleb’s side for emphasis, and Caleb’s sigh of relief is quiet, but seems impossibly loud in the relative silence of the room.

 

The quiet comfort is shattered with chattering as Molly and Fjord push the door open and wander in, Molly’s little ramble cut off the second they spot Caleb and Clay, and Caleb doesn’t move quite as immediately as his body tells him he should. He doesn’t look at Molly, keeps his eyes on Clay as he sits up from his shoulder and draws his hand back, fingertips trailing once more over the scar.

“I’ll see you later?” He asks Clay quietly, though that part is fully unnecessary, the room is silent again now. Fjord is pulling Molly along to his bed to sit.

“See you later.” Clay agrees, and Caleb pats his shoulder before he slips away.

Molly doesn’t say anything, but they do flump down on Fjord and curl into him. Fjord can do little more than put an arm around their waist and hold.

  


Fjord does not have another visit from the thing in his head for a month after the stabbing, when the first semester of Solazone is truly underway and he’s halfway through writing an essay on the Hero of Water.

He’d chosen Rula for his original study anyway, so a lot of it is just cross-referencing what he’s already said. He’s lucky to have a favourite in his own magic type- Clay’s original essay had been on Saake, and he’s onto Abel now. It’s not too terrible, having those two crossed over, a lot of their history ends up twined. But Molly, who picked a favourite in Elvanlice and now needs to write about Jimmy- bless their heart. This is the third time that they’ve tossed their panel aside and groaned, swinging upside down over the side of the bed. They hate essays. They hate writing. They’re just not _good at it-_ it’s the dyslexia, Yasha reassures as she tries to help, but she’s hardly any better. Fjord will help them both, when he’s finished with his own.

He’s getting to the sacrifices that Rula had made during the first Re-Sealing of Caertium when he hears it in the back of his mind,

_Fool that she is._

Fjord grimaces. It’s been a quiet month without that thing around.

_I need you to do something for me again, my Vessel._

“I’m writin’.” Fjord says irritably, and Molly, upside-down off the side of their bed, looks over,

“Yeah? We know?”

“Not you.” Fjord’s tone doesn’t change, though his eyes flicker to them, and they give a soft noise of understanding.

_You can write later. I may even help, if you’re a good little pet._

“And how can _you_ help, pray fuckin’ tell? What d’you know that th’ books don’t?”

 

There’s a pause, and then Fjord blinks, and suddenly he’s in another place. Somewhere terrible and mortally cold, the floor beneath him rough grey stone, the sky dim and the sun- he thinks it’s the sun- is a blood red, casting the ground in an eerie light. He tries to ask _what,_ but his voice doesn’t work, and then there’s a terrible crash and he turns in the horrible space to see what seems to be a distant battle. A tall, broad silhouette that he’s moving toward without conscious permission and as he gets closer they take on features. Grey skin, stained red by the sun and by sprays of blood from the lash of their whip as they spin in their battle, standing over a dark-skinned human with a bobbed curtain of dark hair.

“ _Salt,_ ” Fjord hears the taller one speak over the crack of her whip as she turns and lashes away one of the group of assailants. This one appears to be a dog malisan, snarling, shoulders raised and yelping when the whip cuts across their cheek.

“Jimmy,” replies the human as they struggle to their feet, and the name takes a moment to settle on Fjord’s skin.

_Jimmy._

The Hero of Air, and that would mean-

The human’s head raises and Fjord catches sight of bright yellow eyes, hurt and determined as Salt- no, _Rula-_ sets her hand on Jimmy’s arm and draws a longsword from her waist one-handed but that’s not right. Rula used a crossbow. Never a sword. She didn’t touch swords, after the war.

“Salt, careful-” Jimmy’s voice seems to ricochet through the air, she pulls Rula out of the way and finds the sword aimed for Rula’s throat piercing through her chest, instead, cracking through rib and making her gasp,

“ _Jimmy,_ shit, fuck-”

Rula’s own sword finds its mark through skull bones, a horrid crunching and the sword in Jimmy’s chest comes loose as she collapses one way and the assailant the other. When Fjord’s gaze tears away from Rula dropping to her knees beside Jimmy, he finds himself looking up into his own bedroom and Molly’s concerned face swimming into view,

 

“Fjord? Gods, Fjord, are you alright?”

“You spaced out.” Yasha is on his other side, kneeling on the edge of the bed, “You looked like you were seeing something terrible.”

 _Well?_ The voice in Fjord’s head is still- still, ever-smug, ever-

“Yeah,” Fjord hears himself say, “Yeah, I’m fine, I just- I gotta go somewhere.”

_Good._

“Again? Don’t come back half-dead this time, please?” Molly frowns a little, worry drawing lines on their pretty face.

_I promise nothing._

“I promise nothing.” Fjord repeats aloud, and follows it with a quirked smile, “But I’ll try. How long ‘m’ I gonna be gone this time?”

There’s a pause of quiet in his head, then,

_A few days. A week, perhaps._

“A week?” Fjord replies, incredulous, and hears his disbelief echoed by Molly,

_It is a distance, my Vessel. I will bring you home myself, this time, you do not have to remember anything._

Fjord grimaces, but knows he has no option. He agrees and the thing is as kind as it can be, or he disagrees and everyone gets hurt. So he agrees, hears that thunder-rumble of tempest laughter in the back of his skull.

“A week.” He tells Molly and Yasha, who both hiss in worry. There’s silence, for a few moments, and then Clay pipes up,

“See Jester, before you go. Tell her you love her.”

“You have no idea how much I can’t do that.” Fjord stands out of bed, though, searching for clothes and a backpack and whatever food he can find, changing shamelessly. This is a mark of worry for Molly, who knows Fjord like they know themself, and they know he hates to strip with eyes on him.

They make their way to him, as he’s looking for his shirt, skim their hands down his back and smile a little at the startled noise. He doesn’t stop with his manic search, so Molly tries a different tactic- they wind their arms around his waist, instead, and kiss between his shoulder blades.  
It’s not like they could reach any higher.

They’re _fun-sized._

“Molly? Quick question? What the fuck?”

Fjord has found his shirt, Molly hums as they press their cheek to his skin,

“Call it goodbye. In case you don’t come back.”

“I really don’t think that whatever this is is gonna let me die,” Fjord frowns at the truth in his own words, “I’m too useful.”

_That you are._

“Still,” Molly steps away, takes a second to rest their hands to Fjord’s side and take in his warmth, “I worry.”

“Y’all fuckin’ do, I know. It’ll be fine, I’m just- I’m gonna see Jester. Can y’ help with my bag?”

“Yeah, we’ve got this. You go.” Molly shoos at him until he leaves, and he catches a brief second view of Molly and Yasha folding clothes into the rucksack before the door closes and he’s left alone to the hallway.

He moves to the door to Jester’s team’s dorm and knocks, he has a particular pattern that he knows she’ll recognise.  
Jester herself answers, and Fjord pulls her into the hall and presses her to the wall as the door swings closed, his name silenced on her tongue with the shock of it.

“I’m gonna be gone longer, this time,” he says, too fast, too hurried, “About a week. Give or take.”

He sees worry and hurt in equal measure flicker across her face and sighs as he ducks down to rest his forehead to hers.

“I always come home.” a statement, or a promise, it could easily be either.

“You better.” Jester’s arms find their way around his neck, “Or I’ll come and get you myself.”

He doesn’t tell her that he doubts it, he doesn’t tell her that he’d never be found, he just stays there, bent over with his head to hers and his eyes closed and he feels her _shift_ a little bit.  
And then she presses her lips to his, sweet and soft and he can’t tell her no, doesn’t want to tell her no, instead pressing into it as though she is his last breath of air. He’s always afraid he won’t come back, and he knows she is too, he can’t stop himself loving her. He can’t stop her loving him.

 

Fjord escapes into the night air with his rucksack secure on his shoulder and fear in his heart and the voice in his head speaks no words but sounds still like a maelstrom in the middle of the ocean, raging and whirling and nine kinds of terrifying and then everything is blank.

 

It’s a terrible week for those he leaves behind.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For any of y'all who don't follow my other ongoing fic (All this and heaven too) here's... a reason why this will be bi-weekly from here on out and also maybe end weird
> 
> So: Author is clinically depressed and finally got started on meds this month.  
> Here's the issue: this fic, the one you're reading, is something I've _genuinely enjoyed_ writing, but it seems like people just. don't like it. Like fair og universe au's aren't as popular but trust when i say this story's fuckin baller. that's me complimenting myself. you don't see that. it's gonna be great.  
>  or it will if I can find the motivation to keep writing?
> 
> I don't write for me anymore, I write for the attention and reaction because it's the only time I get validation.  
> Not gettin it has... kinda just crushed my motivation. which, yeah, fair, childish, but y'all deserve to know.
> 
> I have some buffer for OTSP, and one buffer for ATAHT, and I have another two multichapter fics in progress (I know, im wild) but like. writing. hard. need validation.
> 
>  **please call the author an asshole for hurting u**   
>  legit when i write the Angsty Sad Bits i live for people quoting it and calling me an asshole. That's not an exaggeration I like knowing I have that effect. Call the author an asshole.


	6. Louder than anything I'd ever heard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caduceus is a genius, and the group takes a trip out to Port Emelle.

Fjord is still away, silent, during the Vernal Equinox, when Jester and Molly both make their way to the kitchens to make their daifuku, arm-in-arm and sad, because this is usually an activity that Jester undertakes with Fjord.  
Molly is terrible at all kinds of food preparation, but they won’t leave Jester alone.

But the Vernal Equinox is all about distance. Jester sits at her bedside table in the evening and writes Fjord a letter,

 

_Dear Fjord,_

_I don’t actually know where you are right now, so I can’t really say_ oh, I hope you’re having a nice time at the beach! _Or whatever, but you know, I miss you. I want you to come back soon, though since I don’t actually know where you are, you won’t get to read this until you’re back._

_Oh well._

_I hope that you’re safe and having a nice time wherever you are, or as nice as it can be with whatever going on in your head. I love you._

**_I love you._ **

_Stay safe._

_All my love,_

_Jester._

 

She scribbles over the second _I love you_ a few times to really drive the point home, then tucks the letter away into a nice little envelope, ready for Fjord when he gets back.

 

When Fjord returns, it’s haggard and stumbling, no rucksack on his shoulder, his face and arms scratched to all shit and dirt and blood smeared across his features. His clothes are the kind of dry that tells Jester that he’s been swimming in seawater with them.

“Fjord.” She whispers quietly as he comes up the hill toward her. He’d called her, as before, this time without falling unconscious and he collapses against her, twitching and heaving for breath.

“‘M okay.” He tells her and she frowns,

“You’re _not,_ you’re limping and covered in cuts and bruises and you need a bath! Really bad! I’m going to call Molly so they can sit with you-”

“No,” Fjord cuts her off gently, “You. I want you.”

“Fjord…” Worry colours her eyes, she puts an arm around him and begins to lead him up to the dorms, “You’ve got to be naked to take a bath and I’m not _complaining_ , but-”

“It’s fine.” Fjord leans on her far too heavily, “It’s- it’s necessary. Calculated risk.”

“You learned that from Caleb.” Jester says, quiet, and pulls him into the bathroom of her own team’s dormitory when they reach it. She has nice-smelling things and soothing oils and she closes and locks the door and begins to run the water. She keeps the bath clean of oils, for now, aware that it could hurt Fjord- she doesn’t know how badly he’s injured, but she can hear him stripping his sea-stiff clothes behind her. When she turns the water off and turns, he’s stark naked and looks thoroughly exhausted, deep rings around his eyes and no focus to his slit pupils, even the one hand he has over his junk looks like it’s taking a hell of an effort to keep in place.

“Get in.” Jester says gently, and Fjord just wordlessly obeys.

The water is warm, but not _hot,_ it’s just a nice temperature and Jester carefully runs her hands over his arms and shoulders as he settles, looking for obvious serious injury. When she finds none, she dips her hand in the water to lace her fingers with his, and Fjord tips his head back against the edge, eyes closer and breathing shallow but calm.

Jester wants to say so much.  
She doesn’t.

“Do you think soap would be okay? To clean your hair and a little bit of your body because you’re really dirty?”

Fjord only hums softly in agreement, and Jester nudges the side of his head with her nose, hands busy going for the shampoo,

“Get your hair wet then.”

Fjord sagely slips down in the bath until his whole head is underwater, and then Jester sees his eyes open in horror and he sits up quickly, gasping for air. She drops the shampoo bottle and hushes him, one hand on his shoulder, the other cupped around the shampoo,

“Shh-sh-shh! It’s okay, Fjord, it’s okay!”

“I was- I was _drownin’_ I-”

“Hush, it’s alright,” She soothes, leans in and kisses where she can, a trail from his shoulder up his neck, under his jaw, “You don’t have to do it again. I’ll just rinse your hair cupping water in my hands, it’s alright.”

Fjord’s panting dies down a little, and the wild look fades from his eyes, he slips a little lower in the bath so Jester can gently massage the soap through his hair, her fingers trailing down his throat every now and then, taking his pulse far less subtly than she thinks she is.

Jester, eventually, goes from murmuring to singing softly to him, gentle songs in the mariner’s language from Port Emelle, the one they’d dredged from the water nymphs and merfolk. He relaxes at this, further and further, until he’s almost asleep and Jester has to pull him out of the water and listen as he moans softly in protest.

“I know.” she soothes as she sits him on the edge and shuffles off for a towel, “Let me take care of you.”

He does. He has no other choice, Jester gently rubs and pats at him with the fluff of the towel, gives his hair a once-over and tells him to stay put whilst she shuffles off and returns with a clean pair of Fjord’s underwear and one of Yasha’s sleeping shirts.  
She knows Yasha won’t mind. And getting Fjord into his underpants is going to be hard enough, actual pants are just not worth the effort.

“Come on.” She coos when she manages to get him dressed and he’s swaying where he sits. He doesn’t protest as she pulls him through to the bedroom and tugs him onto the bed with her, wraps him in her blankets and her arms and lays his damp head on her chest where he falls to sleep instantly. She rocks, a little, exhausted herself, she kisses at his hair and forehead until she, too, falls asleep.

 

It’s a couple of weeks after this that Clay finds Caleb in his bed when he gets back of an evening, after late-night training.

Having Caleb sleep with him isn’t terribly unusual, now. Something between Caleb’s protective streak and his loneliness makes it a roughly weekly occurrence, but usually, it’s Clay that goes to Caleb, or Caleb that comes in when it’s dark and everyone else is asleep.

But here, the evening light is still in the blinds and Caleb is curled in his bed asleep and Molly has very deliberately walked to their bed to change with their back to him.

Clay changes slowly, peeling out of his leather armor and undershirt and changing to his sleepwear instead, more loose pants and another oversized shirt and he crawls into bed beside Caleb.  
Caleb does not wake up, or move, just remains curled beside the wall and Clay blinks for a few minutes, there, watching the slow rise and fall of Caleb’s sides in time with his breath, the little jostles of his hair and the twitching of his eyelids.

Caleb has become something very dear to Clay, now. Someone special. Just as the rest of his team have, just as Beau and Nott and Jester have. He lets out a soft breath of amusement and turns from his side to his back to check his panel notifications.

 

Clay loses track of the time. When he catches it again, it’s late enough that the sky is dark, Jester has gone to her own bed, and his teammates are asleep, or at least attempting to, no other panel lights the room around him.

He shuts his own off and sets it to the charging plate to replenish the battery, and then he folds his hands in the middle of his chest and stares into the inky blackness where the ceiling is.

It isn’t uncommon for Clay to be unable to sleep. It’s why he’s tired so often, he’ll just lay for hours and hours on end, unthinking, unsleeping, but it’s usually different when Caleb is with him. It’s usually easier when Caleb’s at his side, and tonight proves to be little difference, when Clay turns to his side and rests a hand at Caleb’s hip instead and Caleb wiggles a little closer to him, murmuring.

There’s a still pause, and then Caleb is curling around Clay, one hand balls in his shirt by Caleb’s own cheek, the other slings over and wraps around Clay’s shoulders, he tangles their legs and presses closer and Clay smiles as he reciprocates the affection, Caleb murmuring away. Mostly in his mother tongue, quiet, and then-

Then, as clear as day, Clay hears him,

“ _Mollymauk,_ ” Caleb mumbles sleepily, “My Mollymauk.”

He presses his face to Clay’s chest and Clay doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, doesn’t _breathe_ for a good few seconds before he softens over Caleb again.

Interesting.

Caleb does not wake, and Clay falls quickly to sleep curled over him gently, Caleb wound around him.

 

On the other side of the room, awake, Molly stares at the ceiling with wide eyes, flushed cheeks, and a heart rate that could rival a frightened rabbit’s.

 

 

 

“Hey, Caleb, can I talk to you a minute?” Clay catches his friend as they’re coming out of a lecture and Caleb looks around at him, blinking a little in surprise,

“ _Ja_ , friend, of course.”

He lets Clay catch his wrist and tug him aside, out of direct earshot of the others,

“About Molly,” says Clay, and watches Caleb’s face immediately slacken in shock, and harden again,

“ _Nein._ ” he says forcefully, and Clay actually _frowns_ at him,

“I think you’ll find _ja,_ actually. You know you were talking in your sleep last night?”

“I- I was?” Caleb fights the urge to flush. It’s not like he doesn’t _miss_ Molly. He _does._ He just finds their actions unconscionable,

“Yeah. You cuddled up to me, clingy, and you said their name. You said _my Mollymauk,_ Caleb, so why aren’t you in _their_ bed?”

Caleb winces, turns his head to frown and close his eyes in a direction that isn’t Clay.  
Clay clearly expects an answer. Caleb swallows the bile burning the back of his throat,

“I- I- I have seen… too many people hurt, at the hands of others. Maybe it isn’t their fault. But I- I’m scared that they will- will turn on you again, and if they hurt you, if they kill you- and they could kill you, Caduceus, if someone is not there to stop it- if they do that, and I lo- I-”

Caleb stops, sighs, and takes a deep breath,

“If they do that, and I have allowed myself to care for them the way my heart threatens to, I think that I may break. Fjord gave me some- some very wise, advice, once, about forgetting people’s flaws when you love them. I don’t want to be that. I don’t want to do that.”

Clay just sort of frowns, but his expression has an edge of pity, now,

“Getting hurt is a facet of life, Caleb,” he says, slowly, “If you don’t ever trust, if you don’t ever love, you never experience anything. It’s far better to love and lose than never to love at all.”

“Who said anything about love?” Caleb jerks his chin up and Clay’s expression takes a smug, smirking hint,

“You heavily implied it. You should try being honest with your feelings, sometime, I find it’s very nice. Therapeutic.”

He sees Caleb’s face shift through emotions rapidly, anger and hurt and sorrow and many in between and outside of, and then it slackens.

“I will be making an outing to the tower tonight,” he tells Clay plainly, “With food. And I will be skipping lunch. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Clay blinks as these things slowly flicker into place in his head,

“Right.” Says Clay, “Alright. See you tomorrow.”

 

 

It’s Molly that Clay catches next, about five in the evening,

“Hey, Molly.” he greets, coming up behind them and making them jump a little in place,

“Hey, Deuces, sorry. You shocked me.”

There’s a quiet as the two wander down the hall, side-by-side,

“You going to the canteen, too?” Molly asks, and Clay hums a little,

“Actually, I came to see if you’d come somewhere with me. I don’t think you’ll like it, but I think it’s important.”

Molly looks up at him, and then down at the floor, and then up at him again,

“Where?”

“Is that a yes?”

“It’s a _depends._ Where?”

Clay smiles a little, a mischievous edge to it,

“The tower.”

Molly groans. Clay’s smile widens,

“I told you that you wouldn’t like it. Besides, you’ve probably forgotten how to fly, now.”

“I have _not!_ ” Molly protests, stamping a bit, and Clay raises his eyebrows,

“Hm? Would you care to race me, then? You can fly, I‘ll walk. Run, maybe.”

“You’re _on._ ” Molly says hotly.

  
Clay thinks briefly, as Molly throws themself into the air, that he’s become some kind of genius.

  
They disappear from his sight, not even bothering to check whether Clay himself has moved from the courtyard. He hasn’t.  
He heads back to the dorm.

 

Clay was right, to a degree- Molly isn’t as smooth at flying as they once were, clumsier now they’ve been grounded for a little over a month. But, wobbling a little, they make it up to the tower at full tilt and when they see Caleb they almost fall out of the sky.

They make to turn and disappear as quietly as possible when their golden glow catches Caleb’s eye.

“Mollymauk.” He calls to them through the empty air, and Molly, gulping, turns back to him.

Caleb has been sat on one of the picnic blankets, splayed across the floor, cross-legged, though he’s getting to his feet now. There’s a picnic basket beside him, Molly can see a bottle poking out of the side.  
They make their way slowly over and set down on the wall, the wind dissipating, their body heavy.

“Caleb.” They say quietly, jumping lightly from the wall to the balcony. Caleb stands ahead of them for the first time in too long, vacillating wildly between looking them in the eyes and looking everywhere but them.

“I- ah-” Caleb tries, eyes darting, and Molly swallows,

“I heard you,” they say quietly, “Last night. With Clay. When you- you said my name.”

There’s a wide-eyed pause as Caleb is knocked speechless for the second time that day, and then Molly is bowled straight over on their ass as Caleb charges in and hugs them as tight as he can, his face pressed to their neck and they can feel him sobbing.

“Gods,” Molly gives, half breathless laughter as they bundle him in, too, their ass hurts like hell but they lean back on the cold stone and cuddle Caleb to them firmly, “Caleb. Gods.”

“Molly.” Caleb chokes, muffled by their shoulder, “I’m scared.”

“Why? What’s- Caleb, darling, sweetheart, look at me. I’m happy to cuddle later. Now, I want to understand, okay? What’s wrong?”

Caleb pries his face from Molly’s neck and sits back, tears still streaking down damp cheeks, eyes bloodshot and swollen and Molly shifts a hand to his face to brush the tears from his cheeks,

“Talk to me, lovely. This has gone on long enough.”

“You scare me. You scared me. When you stabbed Caduceus, I- I-”

Molly bites their lip a little, concerned of the truth, but they finally have Caleb here again, sitting in their lap with their hand at his hip and they don’t want to lose that again,

“I should have told you,” They admit, low, “That sometimes that- that happens. I hate it. Nobody can hate me more than me, Caleb, trust me, but I can’t- I can’t control when he comes out.”

“Lucien.” Caleb says slowly, and Molly nods,

“Lucien. There’s still bits of him in there, like glass in a wound, Caleb, and I just want it _gone._ ”

“ _Molly,_ ” Caleb says softly, and Molly shudders almost unconsciously, their grip tightening around Caleb’s waist, just a little, just slightly. Caleb notices. Of course he does, and he leans in to them and rests his forehead to theirs, eyes wide and searching, watching as Molly’s own flutter back open and he waits until he’s sure he has their full attention, the faint outline of red iris on red sclera meeting his gaze,

“ _Mollymauk._ ” He breathes, with as much low, desperate warmth as he can, and watches Molly’s eyes shut again, hears the slight hitch in their breathing and sees the faint glimmer of tears under their eyelashes. He lifts a hand to the side of their face, fingertips tracing the peacock tattoos and then cupping at their jaw so his thumb can rub a rhythm against their cheek,

“ _My Mollymauk._ ”

There’s a few still, silent moment, after this.

So silent that not even the world below them makes a noise, no breeze, no clattering, no breath as they both hold their own in.

It is only Molly and Caleb, suspended in a timeless void where the only thing that matters is Molly’s name.

 

The tension of a bowstring as an arrow is drawn and aimed.

 

There are two options. Three, perhaps.

The first is that the bowstring snaps, and everything falls apart, they go back to that horrible sense of distance and distrust, where they do not talk, pretending none of this never happened.

The second is that the arrow is loosed. The bowstring springs back to place with haste, a resolution that cannot be taken back. The arrow is loosed, and Molly gives into themself, and they kiss Caleb.

The third option is that the bow is lowered, the tension released slowly as the arrow is eased away. Molly does not kiss Caleb. They do not ruin it all. They do not make mistakes they cannot take back.

 

They choose the third option. They hold the tension there for a moment, Caleb in their lap, his breath hot and mingling with theirs in the air and they swallow a couple of times to be able to speak,

“I’ve missed you.” They say, and their voice is husky and thick with the tears they’re fighting and Caleb lets out a hard breath and rocks, keeping his forehead to theirs,

“I have missed you, too.”

 

They lose track of how long they sit there like that, Caleb in Molly’s lap, quiet but for soft murmurs of one another’s names, foreheads pressed together and Caleb’s hand at Molly’s cheek. The picnic, the wine, it’s all forgotten about. Their problems are forgotten about. There are no words that could ever truly make up for the time they’ve missed.

“We need to have an actual conversation,” Molly says softly, “At some point. But not now. It can wait, I don’t want to lose this.”

“ _Ja,_ ” Caleb murmurs, “Me neither.”

Molly’s hands slip from Caleb’s waist, up to his shoulders, his neck, and then they’re holding his face in their hands and they blink their eyes open to look at him,

“My Caleb,” they say, soft, and see him smile a little,

“My Mollymauk,” he replies, just as gentle, and Molly closes their eyes again.

  


They take to Caleb’s bed, that night. Caleb, unsure as ever but more well-adjusted, now, clings to Molly and strokes their hair, his hand on their hip leaves a series of half-moons where his nails dig into skin.  
Molly sighs into every touch, relaxed, here, even as Caleb pulls them fiercely closer in his sleep.

“My Caleb.” They whisper to the emptiness. They do not begrudge themself a soft kiss to the hollow of Caleb’s throat.

He sleeps through.

 

It’s a nice morning. Warm.

The two of them wake up to a gentle breeze that’s cooling their skin in the wake of the blankets being thrown off, Caleb finds himself half flopped over Molly’s body, head on their chest, one arm slung over their waist and the other trapped under him and tangled in their hair.

“Morning.” Molly murmurs, still half-asleep. There’s the sound of birds twittering outside, of someone taking a shower in the bathroom, of someone- presumably Nott- behind them scuffling around.

“You’re awake!”

It is Nott- she comes scuttling to the side of the bed where she’d be visible. Beau is still flopped face-first in her bed, Jester’s is a rumpled mess. She’s probably the one in the shower.

“ _Ja,_ _hallo,_ Nott. Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, everything’s fine! We’re just packing!”

“Packing?” Caleb asks, drawing himself away from Molly to sit up. Molly groans at the loss,

“Yeah?” Nott cocks her head, “Packing? We have a couple of weeks off? We’re going to visit Jester’s mama in Port Emelle?”

“ _What?_ ” Caleb slides out of bed so fast he forgets to put his legs under him, “When was this decided?”

“Just after Fjord came back! You were there!”

“I was _not,_ ” Caleb protests, but as he says it, he remembers a group meeting that he’d paid no attention to, “I was- I was- ah.”

“Yeah. You were there, Caleb,” Molly sits up and puts a hand over the edge of the bed to help pull Caleb up, “You were just distracted.”

Caleb takes hold of their hand and lets them pull him up, gives them a brief, soft smile.  
He’s glad to have them back.

“Well, you better get packing, Caleb! We’re leaving in a few hours.”

“How are we getting there, though? Are we taking the trains all the way to Aldebaran and the ferry from Taurii? Or-”

“Well, we’re getting the train to Taurii, yeah, but I think there’s something going on? I don’t know! Talk to Jester. And start packing!”

And off she goes again. Molly chuckles as Caleb recollects himself from that conversation,

“I knew you weren’t paying attention at the time, you know.”

“ _Ja,_ well, I was distracted.” Caleb faux-pouts at them, and Molly’s face- Gods, the force of the happiness there, it could knock Caleb on his ass if he was even remotely weaker than he is.

Instead, he shuffles up to them and bumps his head to their shoulder, gentle, and he sighs.  
Molly tilts to rest their cheek to the top of Caleb’s head for a few seconds of quiet, peace, and then they pat at his arm,

“We still need to have an actual, serious conversation.” They say, voice low to avoid Nott’s ears, and Caleb nods as he sits back up,

“ _Ja,_ we will. Later.”

He feels a bolt of nerves shoot through him and gently, cautiously, he shifts to lay his hand over Molly’s.  
Their skin is warm under his hand, they twitch a little with the contact and smile at him when he looks. They shuffle a little, flex their hand until Caleb slips his fingers between theirs and holds, tight.

And then he lets go and gets to packing.

  


“I’m _so glad_ we’re going to see my mama, you guys!” Jester vibrates with excitement in her seat, the group split between two tables on the first part of the train journey, the hour and a bit ride from the grounds of Solazone to Hyaffi for their connection well underway.

Caleb leans back in his chair across from her, a small smile on his face, Molly asleep on his shoulder,

“ _Ja,_ it will be nice to get to know the place that you and Fjord grew together in.”

“Oh! Oh, we’ll be able to show you Maramor! There’s still tutors there that know us, Fjord, won’t that be _cool?_ ” She draws the vowels out for emphasis, and Fjord gives a little snort of laughter.

“It’ll be nice t’ see how far we’ve come, I suppose.” And he puts an arm around Jester’s shoulder, squeezing. Clay, on the opposite side, sort of flops across the table,

“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the sea.”

Jester gasps,

“ _Never?_ Deuces!”

“I lived in the forest.” Clay shrugs, a slow smile on his face, and Caleb nods,

“We will have to show you the sea, Caduceus. We can split, when we get there- Nott does not like water, so she will not want the shoreline. Jester, Fjord, you two can visit your prep school, Molly, myself, and you-” He nods to Clay, “Can visit the sea- Yasha, what would you like to do?”

“I, ah… the salt doesn’t really agree with my hair. I can stay with Nott?”

“ _Ja,_ that sounds okay. Nott?”

“Fine with me!” She chirrups, only the tips of her ears visible over Clay’s back, Beau waves in his direction,

“Uh? What about me? Asshole?”

“I was getting to you,” Caleb tuts, and Molly gives a soft whining noise and wriggles a little closer as Caleb’s shifting shakes them. Caleb, unconsciously, lifts a hand and strokes soothingly through their hair.  
They murmur a little more as they snuggle against him and get comfortable again, not that Caleb can make out any words. Beau scowls at him, and he only rolls his eyes,

“You can join us, if you like? Have _you_ ever seen the ocean, Beauregard?”

“Uh… no, not that I can- maybe from like, a distance? Never touched it or whatever.”

“Do you want to come with us, then?”

“Yeah, sounds cool. I can keep Clay company whilst you two… do whatever?”

“Yeah, and we’ll meet you at the beach afterwards!” Jester’s tail whips excitedly in the air, “We can have a sandcastle competition!”

“When are we arriving, by the way?” Clay’s long, fluffy ears perk upright, his purple eyes trained on Caleb rather than Jester,

“Well, we have to stay in Taurii tonight, ‘cause there’s only three ferries a day and we’ll miss the last one by the time we get there. But it’s okay! I have a friend, she runs a really _really_ nice hotel, they have a little garden on the roof, you’ll love it, Deuces.”

“Oh?” Clay blinks, slow and interested, “A garden?”

“Yeah! Cali brought me here once, when we were travelling!”

“Cali? Calianna, the half-dragon?” Caleb cocks his head, and Jester nods enthusiastically,

“Yeah! We dated for a little bit last year and went travelling in the holidays. She took me to some really nice places.”

 

Molly wakes up coming into the station, still curled up against Caleb’s side, head on his shoulder, rubbing at their eyes to clear the sleep haze.

“Almost there?” They ask as they sit up, and Caleb pats at their shoulder,

“ _Ja,_ soon. We have an hour before the next train, would you like to get a coffee or some food?”

“I’d kill for a hot chocolate.” Molly stretches and stands, going for their bags. On the other side, Jester clambers onto her seat to do the same.

“Then that’s what we’ll do.” Caleb smiles, “And- ah- when we get to Port Emelle, us two, Caduceus, and Beauregard will be making a visit to the beach- maybe we could have our… serious conversation there?”

Molly hums,  
“We can do that. I’ve not seen the sea, you know?”

Caleb is quiet for a moment,

“That seems to be a common thing in our little group. I am excited to take you to see the sea.”

Molly gives him an indescribable kind of smile, slips out of the table space as the breaks begin to screech them into the station,

“I’m excited to see it.”

“Well,” Jester drawls, “Technically, you’ll see it at the marina in Taurii, and on the ship, but-”

“But I get to take you to the beach.” Caleb fills in whatever the end of her sentence would be, a hand to Molly’s shoulder, and Molly grins brightly, they duck in and gently headbutt Caleb’s shoulder. There’s an unrestrained excitement to them, their tail lashing, the white-star freckles scattered across their face seem brighter in the thin light through the train windows.  
Caleb, halfway through shrugging his rucksack on, takes a step in and takes Molly’s face in his palms.

To those watching, the mirrored sense of joyous affection is so painfully obvious, the way that Caleb’s eyes light up at Molly’s happiness, the softness of his touch and the rhythm he brushes his thumb in over Molly’s jawbone.  
And Molly is very similar in this way, but they have never tried to be subtle with their feelings, with the crush they’ve been harboring on Caleb since damn close to the beginning. Only Caleb had not noticed. He continues not to.

Clay, privately, thinks that Caleb wouldn’t realise Molly’s feelings for him if they up and kissed him right now.

With the way they’re looking at him, like he has a galaxy in his eyes, Clay would be unsurprised if they tried.

 

They leave Yasha, Beau, and Nott with their bags in the waiting room, with the only stipulation being _bring food back you fucking assholes,_ they have a longer couple of journeys ahead of them.

The first, from Hyaffi to Aquarii, takes only around five hours or so, which isn’t _too_ bad. By the time they get there, it will be just after six thirty, and their third and final train is due to leave only fifteen minutes after they arrive- this one is a direct route to Taurii, stopping at only two stations along the way, but still, the total time for that one ends up around seven hours.

 

“We are lucky that Jester can afford the bullet trains,” Caleb muses to Molly as he sits opposite them in the little train station restaurant.

They have themself a very pretty-looking hot chocolate, with a swirl of cream and little silver stars dotted on the top. Caleb takes a moment to appreciate it- the little stars remind him of Molly’s freckles. It’s cute.

“Yeah, I don’t really wanna be stuck on a train overnight.” Molly makes a face, “Seven hours is long enough.”

“It’s really more like twelve, we only have fifteen minutes in Aquarii.” Caleb smiles over the rim of his tea cup.  
Molly has one hand curled around their tall glass, the other rests loosely on the table and Caleb, being Caleb, gently shifts to hook his little finger around theirs. They give him another one of those wonderfully bright smiles, and Caleb can only return it.

They lick a chunk of cream from their drink, leaving a pause whilst they swallow it. It’s a pain, it gets everywhere, but eventually,

“I’m going to be so glad to get off in Taurii,” They tell Caleb, squishing his finger a little, “We’re getting there- what? Around midnight?”

“More like twelve-thirty to one,” Caleb grimaces, “Luckily, Jester’s hotel choice is automated check in, and we’re all in paired rooms.”

“Oh?” Caleb can _see_ the interest in their eyes and he smiles a little, halfway between awkward and sad,

“ _Ja,_ so Nott and Jester are in one twin room, because Nott demanded it. There are two doubles and one remaining twin, Caduceus and I are taking one of the doubles. Apparently, he had organised this for us back when it was discussed- where would I be without him, hm?”

“Lost.” Molly agrees, though there’s a sad edge to their tone that Caleb completely misses.

“You were paying far more attention than I was, how are you not aware of these things?” Caleb tilts his head, and after a silent pause, Molly feels a gently pull at their little finger.   
  
“I was… distracted?” they try, raising one eyebrow, and Caleb chuckles warmly,

“Understandable.”

 

Molly, it seems, _cannot_ stay awake on trains.

Their victim this time is Clay, as Caleb sits with Nott for the five-hour journey to Aquarii, sketching up blueprints for a potential new weapon. Some kind of gun, this time, as opposed to her crossbow and bolts, something to make her life a little easier.

Molly slumps onto Clay’s shoulder and falls near-immediately to sleep.

 

“Fjord,” Jester keeps her voice low, she bumps her hand to the back of his in the clamour of their friends chattering around them, “Are you okay?”

Fjord’s face shifts through a series of unreadable emotions, but eventually, he leans in against her,

“I- uh- yeah. I think so? I guess I’m jus’ nervous?”

“Nervous? About going home?” Jester cocks her head at him, “Why?”

“It’s your home, Jes, not so much mone. An’ y’know, the sea an’ I ain’t havin’ the best of relationships right now.”

“Aw, Fjord.” Jester sounds… genuinely upset by this, she leans up to his side and kisses his cheek, draws a little smile out of him,

“It’ll be nice to see Marion again,” he muses, “It’s been a long time.”

“She asks about you, you know!” Jester chirrups, “In her letters, and when she calls...”

“That’s nice,” Fjord’s smile is small, but genuine, Jester can see the slight bulge where his tusks are beginning to grow into place, “It’s nice to feel like I’m a part of somethin’, like… like I got a family.”

“You are.” Jester assures, “And you _actually_ will be, one day, you know?”

This is followed by a wink, a bright smirk, and Fjord checks around to make sure everyone else’s attention is off of them before he ducks in to her and presses a gentle kiss to the corner of her mouth,

“Yeah? S’pose we’ll have to wait an’ hope that this mess gets cleared up. I’d like that, I think.”

Jester takes a moment to let this process in her mind, putting two and two together and coming up with _hey, Fjord just implied he’d marry me.  
_ Her expression breaks into bright-eyed, wide-smile, excited and she doesn’t bother to stop herself throwing her arms around Fjord’s neck and cuddling him as tight as she can,

“Fjo-ord!” it’s a bit of a whisper-squeal, she presses her face to his neck and rocks the two of them a little, “I love you.”

“I know y’ do.” He half-laughs, wraps one arm around her back and hugs her back, “I- I know.”

He’ll be able to tell her one day.

  


 

Fjord has to carry Molly to their shared room in Taurii. They had managed to stay awake for three or four hours of the last train journey, sitting across the table from Caleb and Clay, but they had eventually succumbed to the sleep bug. They wind their arms around Fjord’s neck as they get off the train, Fjord gives a loud, huffing sigh,

“Don’t think I’m gonna get a chance t’ carry bags, with this one.” he shuffles Molly and they whine as they burrow closer into his shoulder, making him chuckle a little.

Jester shoulders one of Fjord’s bags, the mail-style shoulder bag, and rolls her eyes,

“How are they _still_ asleep? They’ve been asleep most of the day!”

“It is just their personality.” Caleb gives her a brief grin, and as he slips past Fjord, he pauses to kiss the top of Molly’s head.

 

Caleb collapses onto the bed beside Clay, both of them somehow already changed, Caleb’s hair still damp from the shower and Clay hums as he gathers Caleb into his loose grip,

“Hm. Are you not tired?”

“Exhausted,” Caleb twists in the embrace to flick the switch for the lamps, bathing the room in darkness, “I am not looking forward to another day of travel.”

“I think it’s nice.” Clay’s lazy smile is audible. Caleb tucks his head under Clay’s chin,

“How is it nice to be stuck on a train for almost twelve hours?”

“Well, you get to see all the scenery as it goes by. And the boat is going to be the same, we get to see the islands.”

Caleb shudders and presses impossibly closer,

“Last time I saw the islands, I was at Solace. I really do not want to be anywhere near there again.”

Clay winds himself around as much of Caleb as he possibly can, swathing him in blue-furred friend,

“That’s fair. But you’ve got us, you know, me and Molly and Nott-”

“I know.” Caleb interrupts quietly, “But it is still scary. Come on- we need to sleep.”

Clay huffs a little with the dismissal, but does as he’s told. He closes his eye and lets himself drift off.  
He always did sleep better when he wasn’t alone.  
Caleb, on the other hand, lies awake for a while after this.

He’s really not sure why, he’s _so_ tired, and Clay is warm and comforting but-

But something doesn’t feel right.

He wriggles and turns over in Clay’s arms, sets his back to his friend’s chest instead and studies what he can see of Clay’s hands in the pale moonlight slipping through the window. They’re so much bigger than Caleb’s.

He misses Molly.

Eventually, he sleeps.

 

Clay and Caleb are awoken the following morning by Jester knocking brightly on their door.  
Caleb comes to slung over Clay’s chest, bone pressing into his cheek and likely leaving rib-shaped bruises,

“ _Ja!_ We are awake, Jester, we will be down in a minute.” He calls through at her babbling, and there’s a pause, an acknowledgement, and then quiet and Caleb flops back to Clay’s chest.

“If you’ve told her that, maybe we should get up?” Clay suggests, calm in his voice and his hand warm to Caleb’s back, and Caleb just sort of groans a little,

“Probably.”

Clay chuckles at his reluctance and nudges at him gently with a careful combination on knee and elbow and finger tip, poking at the exact right place on Caleb’s lower ribs to make him wriggle right off of Clay’s chest.

“Ah!” Caleb gives in protest as he wiggles to the opposite side of the double bed, and Clay only chuckles at him as he sits and goes to dress.

The scar is almost invisible, now, the fur grown over the faint white line. Caleb can see it, only because he knows exactly where it is, and he makes the tentative return to Clay’s side- almost getting hit in the face with his tail- to press his fingers over the thinner patch of blue. Clay, used to this by now, just turns to him a little and ruffles his hair,

“It’s still alright.” He assures, and Caleb gives an awkward little laugh, letting his head drop so his forehead rests against Clay’s hip, over his hand, over the scar.

“It was terrifying, Caduceus.” He says, and it is not the first time Clay has heard this. He grabs his clothes from the chair where he’d set them out the night before and collapses back to the bed, taking Caleb, somewhat awkwardly, with him.

“Worked out alright in the end, yeah?” He soothes, Caleb has crawled back to lying on him and he keeps an arm around the human’s back. _I’m here._ He silently insists, _I’m okay._

One-handed, Clay begins to wriggle into his pants. Caleb stays put, a loose force above him.

 

When they finally bail into the lobby about half an hour later, Molly is awake and at one of the vending machines, their tail waving languidly behind them through a self-made slit in their summery-style dress. They don’t turn immediately, busy bending down to get their frosty fine drink from the vending slot, but when they turn and see Caleb their face breaks into a grin.

Caleb skitters over to them alarmingly fast and gives them a brief hug that they reciprocate only with their tail, their hands occupied behind Caleb’s head undoing the bottle.  
Their tail winds around Caleb’s waist, and Caleb winds around their shoulders, huffing half a sigh into their neck.

“I don’t know how you slept for so long, Mollymauk,” he tells them without moving, “I barely slept at all.”

“Oh?” Molly holds the bottle out a little ways from Caleb and hugs his shoulders with the newly-freed arm, pats at him until he draws away, “Clay mentioned you usually sleep better when you’re together.”

“Usually.” Caleb nods, agreeing, “But- it was odd, last night. Clay was- as ever, warm, and- and comfortable but- everything felt… odd. Off. Not quite right.”

Molly feels a smile tug at their lips, but they fight it off. They can’t be sure that they’re right about the reason, after all.  
They pat their free hand to the side of Caleb’s face, where his recently-shaved stubble is beginning to re-grow. They enjoy the sensation so much, in fact, that they duck in toward him and pause just before they get too close,

“Caleb, darling? Is it alright if I kiss your cheek?”

Caleb gives a soft huff somewhere between relief and amusement,

“ _Ja,_ that is fine.”

Molly finishes their movement, presses the softest kiss to Caleb’s cheek and lingers just long enough to revel in the sensation of stubble against their lips. Caleb smiles a little bit at the pleased whip of their tail and the gentle pressure of their fingers on the other side of his face.

When they draw back, Fjord gives a little cough to draw their attention,

“Okay, uh- that’s- that’s sweet an’ all but I think we should get goin’? Everyone’s here an’ we got a boat to get on…?”

“ _Ja,_ you are right, what time is the boat due to leave?”

Caleb drops back from Molly, leaving their hand to fall from his face, and he patters his fingertips at their arm unconsciously until they take his hand.

“We got a little over an hour,” Fjord is checking his panel for the time and ignoring the clock on the wall, “So we can take a slow walk, maybe grab some food on th’ way.”

“Sounds good, is everyone ready?” Molly chirrups, finally managing to get the bottle in their mouth so they can drink.

“I am!” Jester has a backpack and a suitcase, Fjord finally able to carry his own bags, “I wanna get food on the way! I haven’t had breakfast.”

 

They stop by a couple of stores on the way to grab food.

Taurii is, Caleb observes, a very sweet city. All of the buildings and businesses here play hard into the natural aspect, and almost every building has some sort of rooftop garden. Smaller homes tend to have things like vegetable patches, trailing flowers, the larger business buildings more aesthetic-based garden areas but it’s all green and pretty and Caleb gets so distracted staring at the grassy roofs that Molly has to tighten their grip on his hand affectionately and guide him through the city.

He’s so distracted by the ingenuity of it all that he almost misses Molly’s first view of the ocean.

He only realises as the houses begin to thin, and tugs gently on their joined hands,

“Mollymauk,” he says gently, “Soon,”

And then they round a corner and the sea stretches near-endless in front of them, a vast swathe of blue that takes even Caleb’s breath from his lungs and Molly stops in place to stare.

Caleb looks from them to Clay, reaches out, and laces his fingers with Clay’s too.  
The reflection of the sea sparkles and glitters in Molly’s eyes, Caduceus wears a grin so wide and bright it seems uncharacteristic of him.

“You like it?” Caleb asks them tentatively, and Molly makes a strangled sort of noise, dropping his hand so that they can throw themself at him and bundle him into a hug. Clay lets out a bark of a laugh and pulls both of them in, enveloping the two of them in his own embrace.

Caleb half-giggles in the Caleb sandwich, shifts to press a hand to each of their arms,

“ _Ja,_ well, I am glad that you are both happy, but it should be Jester that you are hugging.”

The rest of the group has stopped just ahead of them and is watching the display with some kind of affectionate amusement, as Clay surrounds the both of them in a curtain of pink and Molly laughs manically from their place with their cheek smushed to Caleb’s shoulder.  
Clay makes a noise of wordless agreement and unwinds from them with a final pat to Caleb’s head and goes to hug Jester instead.

Molly, on the other hand, just shuffles the arrangement until they manage to get it just right- Their head to Caleb’s chest and shoulder, with their horn slotted in the gap by his head, and their arms around his waist so that they can stare out at the sea and hug him closer, harder.

“Jester is the one paying Mollymauk.” Caleb says with faint amusement, even as he settles his arms around their shoulders.

“Mm.” Molly agrees, “She knows I’m grateful. This is because I’m glad I have you here, now, for this.”

There’s a lull, where the others chatter to Clay about what he’s feeling- it smells weird, he likes it- and Molly is silent against Caleb. And then,

“The ocean is- it’s beautiful. It’s so _wide_ and _blue_ ,” They squish around his waist a little, “It reminds me of your eyes.”

 

Caleb doesn’t even try to break apart the way that makes his chest swell with something he doesn’t understand. He’s learning that he doesn’t need to understand all of the big feelings his new friends bring.

 

And partially, he’s worried of the implications if he does.

 

He kisses the top of Molly’s head, instead of answering, and they wait in this way for the others to grow impatient and pull them along.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still highkey struggling to write laughs, i will likely switch to bi-weekly updates from here but pls shower me in attention i crave it


	7. Fault lines tremble underneath my glass house

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A ferry ride and Port Emelle- Uh-Oh (Uh-oh)

Getting Fjord onto the boat proves to be… a task. He tries, a few times, to step up onto the steps that function as a gangplank, but keeps falling back looking woozier and woozier,

“If I can get on,” He reasons to himself out loud, “I’ll be fine, I think, it’s just- just gettin’ on there.”

Jester and Beau share a worried look,

“I can help.” Jester offers reluctantly, “I can- I can command you to… do it, but I _really_ don’t want to, Fjord! I don’t want to make you do something you don’t wanna do!”

“I do _want_ to do it, Jes, there’s jus’ something horrible stoppin’ me.”

“Gonna have t’ get on, kids!” One of the crew members of the ferry calls to them, “We’re due to set off in about fifteen minutes, and we gotta do last-minute checks! Ones where we gotta have the steps _gone_.”

There’s a grimace passed around the group.

“Do it.” Caleb pipes up, “Fjord has given you a pass, we are just doing what is best. It will be okay.”

Jester still looks dubious, but she nods, slowly,

“Okay…”

The group watches as Jester’s shoulders drop and pink flares at her fingertips, in her eyes, and when she opens her mouth, it seems that translucent pink flames coat her tongue,

“Come on, Fjord,” she says gently, and they watch as Fjord’s slit pupils flicker, widening and narrowing and pink edged at his eyelids, “We’re your friends, right? It’s okay. Just get on the boat, Fjord.”

Caleb sees her drawing symbols and making movements with her glowing fingertips and knows, in this way, that the talking is only really distraction. It may be laced with the faintest command charm, but what Jester is doing here is physically controlling Fjord’s movement, and soothing him so that he does not fight.  
There is a welling sickness in Caleb’s stomach, and he turns and presses his face to Molly’s shoulder so that he does not have to see Fjord’s eyes glaze over in pink and the awkward, jerky, dreamlike movements as he clambers his way up onto the ferry.

Clay comes up beside Caleb and sets a hand momentarily to his back, between his shoulder blades. And then he follows Fjord.

 

Fjord was mostly correct in his assumption that he’d be relatively fine once he got on the boat. In fact, aside from still looking a little queasy whenever he looks at the ocean, the man is running around the deck offering to help anyone who looks like they may need help, though Jester needs to remind him on multiple occasions that this is a ferry and not a tall ship. They have motors, Fjord. Do you know what a motor does, Fjord? Have you ever worked on a boat not powered by oars, Fjord?

Fjord, flushing, admits that the answer is no to all of these questions, and Molly laughs as they pass him and move to the handrail of the deck and lean on it, staring across the water and the way it parts for the slick hull of the boat.

Caleb comes up beside them, leaving Clay to mediate between Jester and Fjord.

“No sea sickness?” He half-jests, and Molly, smiling, eyes wide and glittering in the light, shakes their head.

“No. This is- wow. This is incredible, Caleb.”

“ _Ja?_ I’m glad you like it.”

Caleb would say, if anyone were to ask, that his attentions were out on the blue crystal waters spreading ahead of them, on the dull blue mounds that he knows to be islands in the approaching distance.

His attentions are on neither of those things. His attentions are on Mollymauk Tealeaf and the warm distance in their eyes, the comfortable way they’re leaning on the railing, their hair and dress caught and whipped by the warm ocean wind on this late spring day. His attentions are on the way that the light catches their cheekbones and the line of their nose and their fine chin, on the way the sunlight stains their lips a pale sunrise gold in a way lip gloss never could.

That is where Caleb’s attentions lie.

Until he shivers, a whole body vibration that has Molly chuckling as they tear their eyes from the water to look at him instead, wrapping his arms around himself to hold the heat in. The brisk sea air is pulling the warmth from his skin even through his sweater and Molly reaches out to touch the back of his hand,

“Cold, darling?”

“ _Ja,_ a little.” Caleb gives, smiling awkwardly, and Molly takes his wrist and pulls him toward them,

“Come on, here.”

Caleb lets Molly place him at their back as they turn to the water again, lets them wrap his arms around their waist.

“I’m naturally a hot water bottle,” they assure him, “Cuddle up.”

Their attention is pulled back out to the water, and Caleb does as he’s bidden, lays himself along the length of Molly’s back and sets his chin to their shoulder, closing his eyes and letting himself lean into them.

They are warm. Warm, and soft under his hands, his arms, their dress whips around his calves and their hair is blown back behind the both of them and Caleb likes it here. Molly’s horn knocks his head gently. Caleb has completely forgotten that he can warm himself by magic.

He smiles at the affection.

 

 

Jester catches Fjord halfway up the ladder to the scout post on top of the captain’s chamber, the highest point of the ship.

“Fjord?”

He pauses and turns over his shoulder, eyes wide and guilty.

“Hey- uh- hey, Jes.”

“What’re you _doing_?” She raises her eyebrows and draws the word out just to watch him wriggle,

“I… thought I’d play scout? I mean- I- uh. I like. Seeing.”

Jester just silently stares at him, watches him fiercely as he flushes deeper and darker and slowly creeps up the ladder until he’s at the scout post still staring down at her.

“Don’t fall.” She warns in sing-song, a smile playing at her lips and he gives an awkward grin right back,

“I won’t.”

 

Clay watches Molly and Caleb for a while. Whilst Nott has scampered off to distract Jester from her Fjord-Fussing, whilst Yasha and Beau disappear to the stern to sit and watch the mainland disappear over the horizon, Clay sits at the side and watches with sharp eyes.  
Caleb seems almost to fall asleep on Molly, for a time. Perched at the bow of the boat, watching out at the approaching islands.

And then Clay sees Caleb tense from top to toe, and Molly turns in his grip to face him, taking his face between their hands. They’re too far for Clay to hear, too far for him to quite be able to read their lips, but he can tell from Caleb’s raised shoulders and tense posture that something is upsetting him, and Molly’s wide eyes and soft touch belies their reassurance.

He gets to his feet and makes his way toward them, slowly, carefully, Molly’s eyes dart to him and back and Caleb whips around to catch Clay’s eyes.  
Clay knows, remembers like a shock of electricity that Caleb’s old school was here, and he’s offering his arms out just as Caleb tears for him.  
There’s a soft _oof_ , as Caleb thuds at full-force into Clay’s chest and winds around him, Molly watching from the bow with some sort of hurt jealousy licking in their eyes.  
It can’t last long, when Caleb turns with one arm still around Clay and reaches for Molly, too, arm outstretched to them and they cross the deck hastily to take his hand and drop into the cuddle huddle. Clay holds the both of them in a curtain of pink hair and a wall of thin blue body, Caleb tugs the both of them close. Molly doesn’t understand, but Clay does. Clay knows.

“Y’wanna go inside for a bit?” Clay rumbles, his voice low and comforting, “Get a drink, maybe?”

At Caleb’s shoulder, Molly is littering light kisses over the fabric of his sweater in a wordless show of reassurance.

“ _Ja,_ let’s- inside. _Ja._ ”

They move as a unit, Molly on one side of Caleb, Clay on the other, crowded around the human with gentle affection and soft words. They take him down into the belly of the ship, where the restaurant-café sits with a handful of other passengers taking tea, coffee, and little cakes.  
Clay sits Caleb down at a table to the side of the room, Molly staying close to him.

Clay wanders off to order and pay, and when he looks back to the table, Caleb has his head on Molly’s shoulder. They’re murmuring to him quietly through lips pressed to the top of his head, gently stroking loose strands behind his ear. Caleb looks thoroughly exhausted, clinging loosely to Molly’s arm, one fist balled in their dress at their thigh.

“Sir?” The person at the desk waves at Clay, drawing his attention from Molly’s gentle affection, Clay turns back with his sleepy smile,

“Sorry, sorry,” He apologises, the elf behind the desk nods forgiveness, and Clay recites the three orders. When he returns to the table with a tray of tea and cake, Molly has Caleb’s face in their hands again, resting their forehead to his, murmuring soft placations.

“... _Can feel that, yeah?_ ” Clay catches, ears flicking as he comes just within earshot and pauses, “ _I’m alive. You’re alive. Deuces is alive- we’re okay. We’re not going anywhere._ ”

Caleb’s thumb brushes over Molly’s collarbone, his fingertips pressed to their throat, where their pulse is strongest,

“ _I’m still scared._ ” Clay hears him murmur, “ _You- what if you- what if you are hurt? Any of you? Nott? Beauregard? What if_ you _get hurt, Molly?_ ”

Molly lets out a breath of a laugh, tilts their head to bump the tip of their nose to Caleb’s,

“ _You promised me you wouldn’t die. I promised you I wouldn’t die. We promised we’d stay alive together._ ”

That’s about where Caleb looks up and notices Clay, standing awkwardly, watching quietly, smiling a little at the display, and Caleb sits back in his seat with such speed that his jaw clacks.  
Clay comes and sets the tray down,

“If you want some time alone, I’m sure Fjord won’t mind a second pair of eyes up on deck.” Clay offers, but Caleb shakes his head,

“ _Nein,_ I- I would prefer that you stay here. With me.” and he offers his hand across the table to him. Clay takes it, loosely, the way he keeps his grip on Caleb at any time, avoiding the jealousy in Molly’s eyes.

 

 

The journey stretches through the night. Clay and Caleb retire to their own cabin room early on, and though Clay changes quickly, he finds Caleb sat on the end of the bed in his sleepwear, holding one of his plainer scarves in his hands and staring,

“Caleb?”

“I- Caduceus. If… I- ah-”

“Hm?” Clay can read Caleb’s wants like a book, but he needs to hear him say it, “What’s wrong?”

“I… I always slept… better, with you, knowing that you- you were okay. You were alive. I still do- I still care- I just-” he swallows, hoping desperately that Clay will finish the sentence but knowing he will not, “I… want Molly.”

Clay sits beside him on the bed.

“I know you do.” He pats Caleb’s shoulder, “But I think you might be running back into this too fast. If you run to them every time you’re sad, before you’ve had a conversation about exactly why you separated yourself from them in the first place, you’re gonna give yourself a complex, and Molly a problem. It’s alright to want them, but you’ve got to even it out.”

Caleb sighs and nods and shifts to shuffle down into the bedclothes, back to Clay.

“ _Ja._ I suppose you are right. Goodnight, Caduceus.”

It’s… off. Cold, somehow, but Clay thinks he understands.  
He gathers himself into the covers too, back to Caleb,

“Night, Caleb.”

 

 

Caleb comes to that night in the middle of what feels like a storm.

It’s not the first time he’s awoken, but every other time had found Clay’s back pressed to his own, rhythmic breathing drawing Caleb back to sleep.

When he gets up this time, there is the sound of thunder, the boat rocking, and Clay is no longer behind him. The air is cold and thick and aside from the thunder and the violent lurching, everything is still, silent, he can’t hear the faint voices in the hall that have been present the rest of his time here and he gets out of bed before he realises he’s doing it, feeling sick, somewhat like a baby deer wobbling around on newborn legs.

“ _Caduceus?_ ” He hears his voice like an echo, the walls of the room warping in his dizziness. There is no reply.

But there is a knock at the door.

 _Rat-atatat-at tap-tap,_ and that- that rhythm, it’s familiar but his brain won’t place it, addled and stormy and twisting and he’s at the door. Somehow. He didn’t feel his legs move to get here. Perhaps he floated.  
He works on the lock- it’s locked from the inside, where’s _Clay,_ he wasn’t in the bathroom when Caleb passed because the light was on but he doesn’t remember passing? He remembers looking in- very clearly, like a bell, he sees the empty bathroom in front of him, shower curtain drawn back- where was he?

The door. Right.

The locks- from the inside- come loose, the door opens, and Molly is standing there.

Their eyes are wide and tear-rimmed, they’re still wearing that pretty red dress from yesterday- it must be- what? Three in the morning? Caleb can’t really tell- but they’re still wearing it and worrying their lip,

“ _Can I come in?_ ” their voice seems far away and Caleb is taking their hand and pulling, the door swinging closed-and-locked behind them, Caleb sees the bolt slide into place.

“ _The storm?_ ” He hears himself ask in what seems like a whisper and Molly nods, their hair falling in waves across their shoulder, an ink stain in the storm of the sea, Caleb coos and pulls them into a hug,

“ _You can sleep here. It is alright._ ” He assures them, and Molly’s arms twist to find the zip at the back of their dress as Caleb holds their waist, watching, only watching the intensity on their face, the bit lip, the averted eyes,

“ _Can’t get it._ ” Molly says, exasperated, “ _Unzip me?_ ”

When they turn, Caleb feels his heart seize in exhilarated fear, his hands don’t shake on their zip and it doesn’t seem unusual, every inch there revealing more purple, smooth purple, he trails a finger down their spine when he’s done and they laugh.  
And then he blinks and the dress is gone and it’s just him and Molly, standing in the middle of the swaying room, the walls still twisting around him,

“ _Molly,_ ” Caleb hears himself whisper, halfway between reverent and worried, he presses his palm to one side of his face and then he’s kissing them, gentle, the soft static-heat feeling of his lips on theirs and there’s a swell of emotion that makes him want to cry, he can feel the heat of their skin under his hand, can see the tears on their lashes.

Why are they crying?

There’s so many- so many tears and the kiss is so wonderful and sweet and Caleb- Caleb is crying too and then he opens his eyes again with a jolt.

Clay’s back is pressed to his, the covers are pulled up under his chin, and there is no storm.

“Ah.” Says Caleb, aloud, and his voice does not echo, “ _Sheiße._ ”

 

When dawn comes the next morning, Caleb has been awake for an hour already. It wouldn’t be too terrible, in the colder months, when the dawn would come at seven, eight in the morning but no- this late spring, the dawn comes more near to six, five-thirty, and Caleb has been awake since 4:37am precisely. He’s been on deck since six, sitting at the bow of the boat in the grey light, watching the waves cut around them.  
He sits and watches the main island come into view, the edge of Zosma dark against the bright line of water.

There’s a hand on his shoulder, and he would jump if he hadn’t known it was Molly.

“You alright?” They ask, kneeling beside him, he watches them tuck a strand of hair behind one ear and feels his heart jump. Traitorous thing.

“ _Ja,_ I was awoken early by a- ah- bad… dream?”

Molly hums sympathetically,

“Alright, stay put, I’ll be back in five.”

They’re gone again, and Caleb’s chest unclenches.  
He has… a lot, to unpack, about the dream, about the way he might feel about Molly, about- everything. But he can’t even begin to consider picking it apart until they’ve had that conversation they so desperately need, and the two of them have already agreed to a time and place on it. It’ll have to wait.

Molly returns, drops to a crouch and offers Caleb a gently steaming mug,

“Tea.” They tell him, and when he takes it with murmured thanks, they set their own mug- hot chocolate- down and sit basically in his lap, legs slung over Caleb’s and close to him. They collect their drink,

“Ah- Molly?”

Molly freezes,  
  
“Too much? Sorry-”

“ _Ja,_ for now, I- my dream- it- um-”

“You don’t have to give a reason.” Molly assures as they scramble back and sit beside him instead, not pressed to him, but comfortably close, and Caleb sighs over the surface of his tea,

“Thank you.”

“Hey, any time.” Molly assures, smiling, and the two of them lapse to silence as they drink. Molly takes the mugs away when they’re done, returns to the same position and the two of them watch the thin sea mist that rises with the sun, coating the ocean ahead of them and blurring Zosma as they skim around its edge.

It comes as no surprise, really, that by the time the sea mist has burnt away, Caleb has collapsed into Molly’s lap, asleep.

 

 

They arrive at Port Emelle in the early afternoon. Now that they’re so close, Jester is untameable, vibrating at incredible speeds and dashing around in a blur of pink so fierce that Fjord has to catch her as she flash-steps past and hold her hand to stop her draining herself.

 

 

They’re all tired and excitable and they move quickly through the streets of the portside city, with Jester pointing out nice shops, places she used to go or hide or play, greeting a handful of people that recognise her with the biggest smile that Caleb has ever seen on her face.  
Most of the buildings- or the businesses, at least- seem to fly colours here, some appear to be relevant to whatever Gods are worshipped, others seem to be jewel tones for the sake of pretty colours. Either way, great swathes of fabric flutter in the spring breeze, making wonderful snapping noises and filling the streets with life and colour.

Jester’s home is, honestly, no different. Most of the colours here are in the red shades, rich ruby, coral, crimson- and then somewhere up by the top of the tall building, there is one wide swathe in a bright magenta.

“That’s my room!” Jester points excitedly as it comes into view, “For Saake!”

And then she’s shaking loose of Fjord’s hand and nobody can stop the little blue-pink blur as she zips up the street and knocks the doors to her home open.

“ _Mama!_ ” They hear her call from halfway down the street, “ _I’m home!_ ”

Fjord sighs, but there’s a hint of an affectionate smile on his face,

“Jester’s mother works evenin’s only, so her home doubles as a… brothel, I guess? Really ain’t sure on wordin’- but that’s only evenin’s an’ that’s kept separate from the family guest rooms. Still, thought I should warn y’.”

“When you say _brothel,_ ” Molly leans forward, interest written on their face, “Do you mean that Jester’s mother is a lone courtesan, or that she has folk working for her?”

“Uh- when I _left,_ it was th’ former, but she was talkin’ about possibly bringin’ in a couple others. You’d have t’ talk t’ her about it.”

Molly nods enthusiastically, and the group comes up the stairs to The Lavish Chateau.  
The inside is just as pretty as the outside, lit with overhead lamps, colouring the room a warm gold and glimmering across the chandeliers. In the middle of the room, Jester has jumped into the arms of a taller, red-skinned hellborn, laughing with delight. They can hear her babbling about her mama from the entrance, and Clay and Fjord close the doors behind them.

 

Each of them is given their own room in the Chateau, which Caleb finds… surprisingly nice. It’s been a while since he had time all to himself.  
He doesn’t have that _right now,_ of course, but… soon.  
He’s flopped back on his bed, bagless, only a few seconds of rest before there’s a rap at his door.

Molly doesn’t wait for him to answer. They knock and open the door immediately, wandering in and flopping on Caleb’s bed beside him, one arm slung over his waist.

“Hi.”

“ _Hallo._ ” Caleb reaches over to card a hand through Molly’s hair.

There’s a few moments of exhausted silence,

“Ready for the beach? You promised!” Molly tries for sing-song and only further betrays their nerves. Caleb gives a soft chuckle, rolls onto his side and leans down to kiss Molly’s horn. He doesn’t feel so nervous when the two of them are alone like this.

“ _Ja,_ I am ready. Do you want to go now?”

“Mm. Couple more minutes of this, please?”

They turn toward him and find his smile gentle, affectionate, he still has one hand in their hair,

“Of course, _Schatz,_ let me know when you’re ready.”

 

They take a few minutes out, just to lie there and breathe and be quiet, but eventually, Molly grows restless and springs up.

“Right!” They exclaim, fingers twitching, “Beach!”

“ _Ja,_ let’s go and collect Beauregard and Caduceus, and we will head down.”

Molly goes darting off, presumably to grab Beau by the direction, and Caleb locks his door behind him before he disappears to find Clay’s room.

  
Clay is pretty much ready when Caleb knocks. He hasn’t changed much, more at Fjord’s advice than anything, he’s removed his favourite long, flowing shirt, and his boots, instead wearing some kind of sandal perfectly fitted to his cow-like feet, and an equally gauzy but slightly less long t-shirt with distressed sleeves. Caleb hums his approval when Clay opens the door to him,

“You look nice.”

“Thank you.” Clay’s smile is wide and excited and Caleb mirrors it without thinking,

“ _Ja,_ so, are you ready for the beach?”

“Think so.” Clay looks around his room, “Are we leaving now?”

“Mollymauk has gone to collect Beauregard, so I believe so. We’ll meet them downstairs.”

“Alright,” Clay shuffles out and locks his door, “Lead the way.”

 

Molly hits Jester levels of excitement, skipping down the street. They dart from one side to the other and back, buzzing in their anticipation and Caleb, like Fjord, eventually has to catch their hand to stop them being a nuisance to everyone around them.

“Calm down, _Schatz,_ you don’t want to wear yourself out.”

Molly only hums. Their fingers routinely tighten and loosen between Caleb’s.

 

The beach is not far from Jester’s home, and as soon as they get onto the concrete ramp down to the sand, Molly is tugging Caleb down along with them. Beau and Clay follow with exclamations of alarm, and then Molly is letting go of Caleb to dive onto the soft gold. Caleb huffs, affection in his smile, as he watches Molly roll around on the loose sand and scatter the stuff everywhere.

“You know that you will have sand in your hair forever, now?”

“I don’t care!” Molly chirrups, stopping on their back and taking a few deep, somewhat sandy breaths, “This is wonderful!”

“Oh, this is nice,” Clay has knelt, too, running his fingers through the sand, “I like this- oh- oh, Caleb, look!”

He holds up a little shell, and when Caleb looks, it seems to be one of the pretty pink cockle shells that litter most beaches here. Clay’s excitement is so obvious on his face, he tucks the shell into his pocket and disappears to go rooting around for more.

“I’m gonna- uh- follow him. Make sure he doesn’t walk right into the sea. Catch y’ later.” Beau waves as she runs after him, bare feet kicking up clouds of sand and Caleb turns back to Molly.

“Ready to get up?”

“No.” Molly grins, but they sit anyway and take Caleb’s offer of helping them to their feet. They take a moment to look around, at the scenery, at the sea, back to Caleb.

Who is still wearing his long coat.

“Are you not overheating?”

“ _Nein,_ I- this one is actually, very light. Similar to yours, in material.”

Molly hums as they run a hand over it, and true to word, it seems to be some kind of silk.

“Alright, understandable enough. Let’s- ah- go for a walk. We have to talk.”

Caleb hated that this was coming, but he was aware nevertheless. Molly wanders a little ahead of him, in only their patterned pants and flowing shirt, coat and boots abandoned back at the chateau.

“Coming.” He calls to them, and they wait for him to catch up.

 

 

“I know that it wasn’t your fault,” Caleb says, wandering beside Molly at the lapping edge of the ocean, “I understand that now better than I did before but- hm. It still… scares me. To see you- your body- hurt someone that I care for, as I do for Clay. That you care for. You would- you would have killed him, I do not doubt, had nobody stepped in.”

“Thank the Gods you did.” Molly murmurs, and Caleb nods,

“I know that you don’t control it. I do not blame you, Mollymauk, my Molly,” he shoots Molly a careful smile and misses their wide-eyed flush, “But I am still scared. Because Fjord told me, that day, in fact, that you block out the bad pieces when you care for someone and I- I don’t want to be blinded by my- by our… bond, should something terrible arise.”

Molly nods along,

“It… hurt. That you didn’t want to hear me, look at me, or… anything, I just- you were important to me. Very quickly. You are important to me. I know I hit the ground too fast, I don’t really have the experience to do otherwise but- if it can be helped, I don’t want that again. I don’t care if you have to keep me at arm’s length, or… something like that. Just- just don’t shut me out like that again. Please.”

“We’re all fucked up,” Caleb quotes quietly, “And we’re all damaged.”

Molly, smiling, the edge of tears to their eyes, nods.

“Beau.” They say knowingly, there’s no question to their words. Caleb nods and takes a soft, shuddery breath, he turns to Molly and takes their hands,

“I suppose on a level, now that I know, I am also afraid that- that one day, you will have an episode where Lucien… comes back. And- and you _won’t_ come back. I- ah- I am afraid to lose you like that. I thought that if I kept myself apart from you, it wouldn’t hurt so much if, or when, that ever happens.”

Molly is smiling despite the tone and the sadness they feel creeping into their eyes and splashing down their cheeks,

“I’m afraid of that too. But I have a lot to fight for, you know? I have a life, and it’s _mine,_ this body, it’s _mine_ now. Lucien- if he tries to take that from me, take the people I lo- I- I care about. You. Fjord. If he tries, he’s going to have one hell of a fight on his hands.”

To emphasise their point, they squeeze Caleb’s hands gently,

“This life is mine. I’m not giving it up.”

“ _Gut,_ ” says Caleb gently, and pulls them into a hug, loose and warm and sad all at once, “Because I don’t want to lose you.”

 

It takes a few minutes for Molly’s sobs to subside, for Caleb to relinquish his hold on them, and when they draw apart, the ocean has lapped its way back from them by a good half a metre. Caleb hums,

“The tide must be going out.”

“It does that?” Molly’s tail is waving again, like nothing had ever been wrong, their eyes are bright and wide and Caleb laughs at them,

“ _Ja,_ it moves with the moons. I know that it is predictable, but I never truly bothered to memorise the patterns, despite Solace having a section of the campus on the seafront. The tide patterns change every few days, as one of the moons is larger, and further from Aracanus, so the pull it exerts is slightly weaker than the other, and they overlap at different times. Do you- ah- do you know the names of the moons? I’m aware it’s not a basic knowledge-”

“Yeah, um. I think, isn’t the white one called Neon?” Molly’s tail twitches as they fight to remember, “And the- the pink one is… um… um… Pompus?”

“That’s right.” Caleb beams, “Neon is the larger of the two, further away, and Pompus is the closer, smaller one. Do you want to go in the water?”

Molly is already taking his hand and pulling before Caleb can get the sentence all the way out and he laughs at their excitement, a gentle, friendly laugh that makes him feel as though he’s full of helium,

“Alright, alright, let me take my things off. There’s a rock over there, they’ll stay off the sand that way.”

Molly follows him, at his heels as he takes off his coat, shirt, boots, and socks and folds them onto the rocks. He turns back to Molly and offers them his hand, and they drag him into the shallow spray with reckless abandon. The water at the edges of Port Emelle is bright turquoise and clean, an effort on the government’s part to undo the damage of the industrious era of Zosma, one that succeeds and pertains even now. Molly pulls the two of them until the water is roughly mid-calf in height,

“It’s… actually warm.” they say, surprise in their tone and Caleb chuckles warmly,

“It is shallow, so the sun heats it. Further, it will be cooler.”

“Oh, swimming sounds fun,” Molly comments wistfully, “I don’t know if I can- Caleb?”

Caleb is struggling to lift Molly from the water, but they’re small and slight and he manages,

“ _Caleb!_ ” They’re giggling in his ear and he’s grinning,

“Gonna throw you,” He warns, struggling a few steps further into the water, so it’s roughly thigh-height, “You’re going in the water.”

Molly mewls some giggling protests, and Caleb pretends he is deaf to them. With all the strength he can muster, he flings Molly into the water perhaps half a metre from himself, and ducks away from the colossal splash that they make. He gives a bark of a laugh as they sit up, spluttering laughter and grinning,

“How dare you!” They tell him, bubbling over their amusement, “Mister _Caleb,_ I’m drenched!”

“I’m sorry,” Caleb chuckles, offering them his hands, “You- you can wear my coat, and shirt, it was just- too funny.”

Molly takes his hands and for a moment, Caleb thinks that they’ll rise from the water, dripping like some pre-pubescent boy’s wet dream.

Then they give him a devilish smirk and yank him down into the water with them.

There’s a moment where they collapse in the shallows, Caleb atop Molly from the terrible angle and both muffling their laughter to avoid inhaling water and when they emerge, again, the world seems better, somehow. Brighter, as they climb to their feet. Molly is, in fact, dripping wet. Water runs in rivulets off of their horns, for all intents and purposes, they could be the crop-top star of a dirty magazine but they’re here, soaking wet and pressed to Caleb, instead. Their eyes are on him, nothing and nobody else has their attention, their arms are around his waist and they’re giggling against his shoulder and _oh,_ Caleb has missed them so much.

 

The two of them make their way back to the rock, damp and sandy, and Caleb hands his shirt to Molly, pulls his coat over his own soaked binder, and smiles as they wriggle into the plain blue fabric. It suits them nothing like their own clothes- their flowy shirt is stripped and thrown to the rock to be collected later, ideally- but it suits them all the same.

“Think you could braid my hair?” Molly asks, turning their back to Caleb. He chuckles warmly,

“Only if you do mine.”

“Deal.”

Caleb keeps a series of small bands in his pockets for times like this, when his hair is damp and needs tied back. Molly’s hair is longer than his own, thicker, but the bands should hold as long as he doubles up.  
He makes a neat braid from the back of Molly’s head, simple as possible, and they return the favour for him. He almost falls asleep, with their dull claw-tips combing through his hair, with their sea-roughened voice chuckling in his ear about how they hope one day they get to do this better, prettier, more time. He catches a comment comparing his eyes to the ocean, again, and pays little mind to it, only perking up when Molly kisses the top of his head.

“There we go, salty. Ready for a walk?”

“Mmm. _Ja,_ it is a nice day, we should also check on Beauregard and Caduceus.”

Molly rolls their eyes and stands, stretching, frowning at the sensation of their wet pants. Denim is not a nice material to be damp.

“I am,” They say, hands on their buttons, “Taking these _off_. Thank the _Gods_ that you’re so much taller than me, this shirt is like a dress.”

Indeed it is, reaching almost their mid-thigh when their arms are lowered, they show this off as they make a final effort to peel themself out of their pants. Caleb gives a soft laugh,

“ _Ja,_ well, unlike you, I am not _fun-sized._ ”

Molly’s face splits into a bright grin and they skitter forward, on their tiptoes to kiss Caleb’s cheek,

“You’re plenty fun to me, though.” They tell him gently, ghosting their fingertips over his jaw- or his facial hair, anyway, he needs to shave. He shakes his head, rolls his eyes, and takes Molly’s hand to drag them off to find Clay and Beau.

 

They come across them toward the cliffs. Beau is sat on a rock some distance out, somewhere she’s clearly had to jump to get to. Clay, below her in the water, bobbing around with his pink hair plastered to his head.  
He stops when he sees Molly and Caleb, primes himself against the rock with one hand and waves with the other,

“Hey, Caleb! Molly!” He calls, and Beau turns quickly to look over her shoulder,

“Oh, hey.”

“ _Hallo,_ are you alright? Having fun?”

“Yeah!” Clay calls back, “This smells _weird_. Feels weird. I like it.”

Caleb chuckles, one hand still in Molly’s, the other shielding his eyes from the sun on the sea,

“ _Ja,_ well, don’t forget to take a shower when you get back! The salt will dry your fur and skin.”

“Noted, thanks, Caleb!”

Caleb waves his acknowledgement,

“Where’re you goin’?” Beau asks them, leaning across the rock and half-shouting to be heard,

“Just for a walk on the beach,” Molly answers jovially, “Getting some salt air in us! Meet you back at the chateau later?”

“Yeah!” Beau turns back to the sea, “Whatever!”

Clay disappears into the water again, reappears a few feet out, and Caleb chuckles at the scene,

“Seems that they’re enjoying themselves. Would you like to wander, Mollymauk?”

“Very much, mister Caleb.” Molly flashes him a smile, more a smirk, and Caleb reciprocates it. The two of them make their way down the beach, along the cliffs, the afternoon sunlight and salt kissing at their skin.

 

They end up wandering the beach far longer, far further than they’d planned.

 

They’d thought little of the broken barbed wire when they’d passed through the considerable hole, completely unaware- at the time- that they were straying into restricted access territory. The grounds of Maramor, specifically, which they only realise when they see the tall blue caps of the buildings against the pale white of the stone. And the groups of students on the hill ahead of them, training.  
And so they turn tail, quickly, pressing to the cliff face in an attempt to stay hidden.

“I can’t believe this,” Molly is giggling, trailing Caleb, dragged along by the hand, “How did we miss _that?_ ”

“It’s an easy mistake to make, _Schatz,_ ” Molly can hear the smile in Caleb’s voice, hears the huff he follows it with.

Feels him tense and stop, watches the raise of his shoulders.

“There seems to be a- ah- guard. Coming toward us. And I did not bring any of my mana crystals with me.”

Molly pulls a face,

“Me neither, didn’t think I’d need them.”

“We are… very screwed, I think. One of them- two of them have tridents. One- water nymph, I think, long hair, dark water, dual-sided trident. One has a net. Human, short, dyed hair. What are we going to do?”

Molly hisses and hums as they try to think,

“We could… make a diversion? If we use our magic at a distance, kick up a fire and a sandstorm-”

“They may see the glow in the shadow, and we don’t know that they would go for it.” Caleb shakes his head, “Too risky.”

Molly takes a deep breath to think, Caleb is calculating the time they have until they’re caught in this crevice.

 

Something occurs to them.

It’s the worst idea they’ve ever had, but-

It might be bad enough to work. The worst, most terrible,

 

“Caleb,” They say, low and quick, “Do you trust me?”

Caleb looks over his shoulder, half-frowning.

“ _Was?_ ”

“Do you trust me, Caleb? I know, loaded question-”

“What does that have to do with the situation at hand? We are about to be speared by sun-tanned sailors with repressed rage issues, and you ask me if I trust you?”  
(Fjord, Caleb thinks, is beginning to make more sense.)

“Fuck, Caleb, just answer! _Do you trust me?_ ”

The guards are almost upon them, now, chattering to one another angrily, the sound of punches, and Caleb dithers a moment, looking between the two. Molly still holds his hand, their eyes are wide and desperate and Caleb-  
Caleb feels everything within him still and steel,

“ _Ja,_ ” He tells them, “I trust you.”

“Then trust that I’m _so_ fucking sorry.”

Caleb doesn’t get a chance to question, because Molly’s fists are balled in the lapels of his coat and they’re tugging him into a fierce kiss that presses them back into the rocks. For a moment, Caleb doesn’t move, even hearing the guard just behind them changes nothing, he’s just… frozen.

 

Molly is kissing him as though their lives depend on it.

 

It’s entirely possible that they do- maybe that’s the thought that drives Caleb’s hands to their hips, he can feel the smooth line of bone under his own shirt and one of Molly’s own hands finds his waist, the bare skin there still damp and sensitive and it’s like they _know_ , brushing their thumb against him. He begins to kiss them back, earnest and pressing and for a moment he worries for their head against the rock. They’ve made no pained noises, though, so he _hopes_ that their braid is cushioning the sharp.

The guard passes behind them, giving little noises of disgust, but they do not bother them.

Molly keeps Caleb pressed to them until their footsteps have completely faded, the desperation fading from the kiss the quieter the scrunch of sand becomes, until they’re doing little more than ghosting their lips over Caleb’s.

“I’m so _fucking_ sorry, I couldn’t think of anything else-”

Caleb, stunned, breaks into laughter,

“That was- ah- well- that is one way to experience your first kiss, I suppose.”

Molly’s heart sinks in their chest, their eyes wide,

“First- first kiss?” They ask, stuttered and quiet even as Caleb takes their hand and begins to tug them across the sand to the exit, “Caleb, have- had you kissed anyone before that?”

“No?” Caleb’s voice is whipped away by the wind, but Molly can hear him, it’s okay, “I- ah- I had always- romantic? Never fell in love. Or- or if I did, because I am unsure, I don’t think that it was reciprocated.”

Oh, shit.  
_Shit._  
Molly, grimly, considers the fact that they’ve fucked up.  
Big time.

But kissing Caleb felt… right. Good. And he’d kissed them back with such enthusiasm that, they must admit, for a moment, they had forgotten all about the guards. The world had been only them, Molly’s mouth against Caleb’s and the heat of his tongue, his hands holding their hips firmly, yet somehow with warmth, a possessive crowding that had Molly’s head swimming.

They know that they have some semblance of a crush on Caleb, something that has been crushed down and corralled by their time apart. They know how handsome Caleb is, how gentle he has been, how-

Honest?

This, Molly thinks, may be a problem.

They forget to collect their clothing before they rush back to the Chateau in a sandy ball of half-laughter and affection, leaving it to be claimed by the sea.

 

The first thing they do when they get back is split up to shower.

 

Molly’s shower is searing hot and long, they spend far too many minutes lost in the flow of the water counting their sins and accumulating their mistakes. They spend far too long rubbing their lavender-scented shampoo into their hair, far too long combing the conditioner through, far too long just… standing there, letting the heat of the water rinse away the salt and their doubts.

And their feelings, too, they add in parentheses in their mind, their feelings for Caleb, the ones they don’t want, the ones that could be more than a crush if they let themself lean into it.

They don’t consider the fact- the truth, really- that it may already be. They do not consider, as they turn off the water and step out of the shower cubicle, that the way they look at Caleb as though he is the dawning sun is not a facet of casual attraction. They do not consider, as they slip on the wet floor, that the way their heart flutters when Caleb smiles is not the twist and twinge of a crush as it could have been with Bryce, Fjord, Jester, Beau.

 

They do not consider, as their head cracks on the tile with a yelp, that wanting and begging for Caleb when they are sick, hurt, sad, this is not how normal friends act. Not the way that Molly wants. Not the way that Molly begs for Caleb’s attentions, a kiss to make everything better.

And they’d made his first kiss into- what? A trope? A joke? Something terrible?

 

Their vision swims messily in front of their eyes, and as it slowly darkens, they think that they might see a blue-grey smudge in the warmth on their chest. They think they might hear the sound of boiling water.

 

But hey, they’re passing out.

What do they know?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was gonna update every other week buuuut because im Cruel im instead taking otsp on hiatus with me until after new years! :3c
> 
> Please call the author an asshole! I really enjoy it!


	8. But I put it out of my mind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly and Caleb make a magical discovery.

“Frumpkin?” Caleb questions as the cat winds around his ankles again, giving his attempt at rapid meows. They sound really more like steam hissing from a boiling kettle, but Caleb knows his familiar, knows that for him to have made himself solid, tripping, desperate, he wants something,

“Frumpkin!” Caleb protests as the cat almost trips him again, “ _Mein Gott,_ cat, you have my attention! Come into my room, I need to put some clothes on.”

Frumpkin takes the edge of the towel in his teeth and pulls aggressively. When Caleb tugs back, Frumpkin lets go, leaving little singed bite marks in the corner.

“Clothes,” Caleb says firmly, “And then I pay attention.”

But Frumpkin won’t let up, refusing even to let Caleb at his drawers, nipping and pulling and biting until Caleb drops the towel to throw his hands up,

“Fine! A robe! And I’ll see what you want, you little menace!”

He grabs one of the bathrobes that Jester’s mother has kindly provided them with- like a hotel!- and wraps it around himself on his way to the door. Frumpkin darts ahead of him, moving straight through, changing the solidity of himself as he does. It must be a pain in the ass for him, Caleb considers, seeing as they’re on the first floor. Frumpkin would have to dematerialise one half of himself, and then re-materialise it on the other side so he can de-materialise the back half. All of that as he runs.

There’s a desperate meow from the other side of the door, and Caleb shakes himself out of his thoughts,

“ _Ja, ja,_ sorry.”

He slips out of his room and stays close to the wall as Frumpkin leads him down the hall and phases through the door… to Molly’s room.

“Ah,” says Caleb, a little peeved, “Frumpkin, stop trying to play- yes, anyway.”  
  
He turns to leave, and is stopped by a ball of very solid plasma cat tripping around his ankles and mewling. And, Caleb frowns- when Frumpkin is playful, this is not his behaviour.

Perhaps something is wrong.

He knocks on Molly’s door,  
“Mollymauk? Is everything alright in there?”

He waits a few moments, but there is no answer. Caleb pulls a face.

“You go in and unlock the door, Frumpkin. It should just be a handle release.”

From the inside, at least, the door is locked with a turn knob that should release as soon as the handle is pressed. From the outside, the room is impenetrable without the master key.  
Frumpkin slips through the door, and for a moment, Caleb can hear him jumping and failing.

And then the door clicks slowly open, and there’s a gentle thud of Frumpkin hitting the floor and skittering away. Caleb pushes in- there is no sign of Molly in their room, but the door to the bathroom is closed.

“Molly?” He raps at the door, “Frumpkin has me worried, are you alright?”

There is no reply.  
Caleb knows that these doors do not lock, there’s no point in individual rooms when the main door locks. He looks down to Frumpkin,

“Are you sure? This is absolutely necessary?”

Frumpkin gives a mewl of reply, and Caleb trusts his familiar. Tentatively, he opens the door and peeks in.

Molly is laid out on the tile floor, stark naked, a small trickle of blood forming a pool under the back of their head. Caleb’s first thought is that it’s going to be a bitch to get out of their hair. His second thought is all the curses in all the languages he knows.

The one he selects, aloud, makes Frumpkin’s back arch,

“ _Kezch,_ ” Caleb swears in Felis, cat-tongue, ‘ _fuck’,_ “Frumpkin, go and find- Jester, Caduceus, one of the experienced healers. _Quickly._ ”

Frumpkin is away before the sentence is complete, and Caleb grabs a towel from the side to lay over Molly’s body, partially to hide their nudity, partially to keep them warm, it’s a little bit of both. After the Clay incident, Caleb himself had branched into healing a little, just a little, enough to keep someone alive should it come to that. Maybe it has.  
He sets his hands gently to Molly’s cheeks and focuses himself into it, into finding the wound- a gash at the back of their head, nothing terrible- and slowly piecing it back together.

Frumpkin returns in less than five minutes with Clay on his heels,

“Oh dear,” Clay kneels beside Caleb, “I’ve got this, it’s alright. What did they do?”

Caleb goes for the tissue as soon as Clay takes over,

“I would assume that they slipped in the wet. Frumpkin came to get me.”

“Oh, you weren’t here?” Clay looks up curiously, “I thought you’d showered with them.”

“ _Nein,_ ” Caleb flushes as he ducks back down to wipe the blood from the floor, “I’d just gotten out of the shower myself.”

Clay hums, focusing momentarily on only Molly, then,

“They’re not gonna like having blood in their hair.”

Caleb almost laughs, but the urge dies as Molly’s eyes flicker open and they groan,

“Ugh. Fuck. Am I dead?”

“ _Nein,_ you are not dead.”

“Weird,” Molly gives Caleb a somewhat pained smirk, “I’m pretty sure I can see an angel.”

That does make Caleb laugh, a soft choke, Clay stands,

“Alright, you should be all fixed up. I’ll see you later, stop _slipping_ , Molly.”

“Sorry!” Molly calls back, sitting upright and wincing at the strain, “Yeah. Ow.”

“You have blood in your hair.” Caleb points out helpfully, and Molly whines like a kicked puppy,

“Aw, I have to get in the shower again?”

“I would really recommend that you take a bath. It may be unpleasant, but you can’t fall over.”

“Ugh. Yeah. You’re probably right,” Molly stands, shakily, one arm holding the towel to their body and the other wheels for balance until Caleb catches them,

“Not to be weird or anything, Caleb, but- uh- would you mind… staying? Just in case? You can stay in the bedroom if you don’t wanna see me naked but-”

“I ah- I was… the first, to arrive, Frumpkin came to get me. So I’ve…” he gestures at Molly’s form, Molly looks at him with wide eyes,

“You’ve seen me naked. You’ve _already-_ right. Yeah. So do you wanna sit in, or- I mean, honestly, you’re _covered_ in my blood, d’you wanna… take a bath with me?”

Caleb shifts his eyes from them,

“Molly…”

“Right, too much, sorry-”

“No, I mean, it is very practical. I am covered in your blood,” He gestures down at his hands and knees, at the edges of the poor white bathrobe, “and I am already naked, so… _Ja,_ sure, it- it’s practical. Do you need me to wash your hair for you?”

“Well, if you’re offering,” Molly’s voice drops to their half-lidded purr, “I wouldn’t say no.”

They’re giddy, and they can’t really tell if it’s from the still-smarting head injury or the concept of seeing Caleb nude- it truly could be either, both, something else entirely. For a moment, Molly’s too-fast brain runs sick-wild on fantasies of Caleb’s hands on their thighs, their tail, of their hands on the bare skin of his hips and his lips against theirs and then they blink right back to Caleb doubled over the bath, sleeves rolled up, putting the plug in and beginning to run the water.

“We are lucky that Jester’s mother is so luxurious in her guest furnishings, _ja?_ Otherwise we would practically be sitting on one another.”

Molly could think of worse things.

Or better, like pulling Caleb’s long, wet hair aside and kissing a line down his spine. Like pulling him into a hug and knowing that it’s okay. Like loving him.

“Ah, shit, that knock did a number on my impulse control.” Molly shakes their head- giving a muffled exclamation of pain- to clear their thoughts, they throw their towel aside over the sink and sit on the edge of the bathtub, watching Caleb swirl the water,

“Impulse control?”

“Stopping the brain running off, you know? Worries, thoughts, that sort of thing. Do you mind oils in your bathwater?”

“What kind of oils?” Caleb lifts his head as Molly pulls a little bottle from a shiny gold bag on the side, by the sink. Caleb recognises it as their makeup bag.

“This one is lavender. Personal favourite, though I do like bergamot, too.”

Caleb hums,

“I will smell like you.” it seems an idle comment, but it has Molly smiling,

“Yeah, you’ll smell like lavender.”

Caleb looks up, briefly, to meet Molly’s eyes. _Gods,_ that blue is piercing,

“Maybe it will help me sleep better, thinking that you’re there. Go ahead, I don’t mind.”

His eyes are on the bath again as he tests the temperature and adjusts the speed of the taps, Molly ducks a little to measure out a rough spoonful of the oil into the cap and lower it into the bath. It’s more of a very mild soap than an oil, one of the emulsifying kinds, but it’s their favourite, and this task is keeping their flush hidden from Caleb anyway.

“You could always just ask me to sleep with you, y’know.” They try, and Caleb snorts a little,

“ _Ja,_ that would probably be nice if I could trust myself not to become overwhelmed.” He shakes his head a little, turns to watch Molly stir the oil through the water with their hand, the scent of lavender already strong, “Perhaps I will ask you sometimes, though.”

Molly’s smile takes on the edge of victory smirk,

“I should hope so. Right, how’s the temperature for you?”

“I enjoy my baths hot, so… this is good. This is nice.”

“Ah, good, we have that in common. Who’s in first, then?”

Caleb hums as his brain does the hard work of weighing the options for him,

“Ah, I should- should get in first, so that you can climb in front of me. For your hair.”

Molly nods and daintily covers their eyes as Caleb picks at the knot of his bathrobe, tosses it with Molly’s towel over the sink. There’s the telltale sloshing and squeaking of Caleb slipping into the bath, and then Molly finds the most delicate tap at their thigh,

“Your turn.”

They’re careful, this time, stepping onto the floor,  
  
“Back to you, or face-to-face?”  
  
“Hm. Back to me, I think,” Caleb muses, and they’re already obeying as he reasons, “It will be easier when it comes to rinsing the blood from your hair.”

Molly settles with their back to him in the water, stretching themself out and giving tiny peeps of pain when it comes. Caleb is working on rubbing the blood from his hands and knees, turning the water faintly orange. There’s a lot of water here, thankfully, it doesn’t look too much like a horror scene.  
(He suspects it will, once they rinse Molly’s hair, but they can re-run the bath to clean themselves off. No big deal.)

“Come on then,” Caleb touches their shoulder gently, “Let’s get your hair clean.”

Molly leans back, and they begin the somewhat arduous task of gently rubbing the blood from Molly’s hair.

It takes a few minutes, but Caleb eventually concludes that it’s clear. And gently, he shoves Molly’s shoulder to get them to sit up,

“Come on, Mollymauk, we should change the water.”

“I’m _tired,_ ” Molly whines, turning a little to rest their head on Caleb’s shoulder, their arms winding somewhat loosely around his waist, “Just a little nap.”

“Ah, no, come on.” Caleb tries, shaking them a little, “If you get up and take a shower to rinse the rest of the blood off, then you can go to bed.”

“Don’t leave?” Molly’s eyes open again, still on Caleb’s shoulder, wide and- oh Gods- tear-rimmed, “Stay?”

Caleb worries his lip, but eventually, he nods,  
“ _Ja._ If you get in the shower and rinse, then I will stay.”

Molly grumbles for a moment, but they do eventually sit up and slip themselves to the edge of the bath, looking back at Caleb as he scrambles for the plug,  
“You too. You were in the bath too. You need to rinse.”

Caleb sighs, but in all fairness, he was already planning on it.

“ _Ja,_ I know. Come on, careful this time.”

The two of them wobble the short distance to the shower cubicle and Caleb is privately grateful that it’s only big enough for one at at a time. He doesn’t doubt that Molly would try to rope them in together. Instead, he steps in first and blasts himself down as the water temperature is adjusting, wringing out the bottom of his hair where it had floated in the bath. A quick rub-and-scrub, and then it’s Molly’s turn.

They’re a little slower than Caleb was, running their hands through their hair to ensure that it’s clean of blood, but they’re still very tired. So they finish up, and Caleb grabs them both a towel from the little cupboard.

“Come on,” He sighs as Molly yawns, guiding them through to the main bedroom by the hands. He’s not Fjord, he can’t take the water from their hair in a smooth motion, but he can heat it so that it dries quicker. Like a portable hairdryer, almost, he sits them at the edge of their bed and slowly runs their brush- heated magically, of course- through their hair, murmuring soft placations when they wince or moan. They’re falling asleep where they sit, it takes far too much effort to get them to put on even a shirt to sleep in, and Caleb is forced to steal one of their larger ones, but they manage it. Somehow, they manage it, and when they slip between the sheets, the bedclothes are warm and Molly snuggles all the way up to Caleb,

“ _Mmm,_ you’re the best.”

“ _Ja,_ I am cool, I know.”

“Fire Mages are hot by principle.” Molly argues distantly, Caleb can feel them smiling against his shoulder and fights his blush to roll his eyes,

“You are a nuisance. Go to sleep, Molly, I’m not going anywhere.”

Molly hums again, happily, and for a few long and quiet minutes, Caleb thinks that they’ve finally fallen asleep.

And then they sit bolt upright, dragging the covers off of them both and making Caleb shiver at the summer-night chill.

“Mollymauk?”

“Caleb-” Their eyes are wide in the faint moonlight from their window, Molly hates to sleep in true dark, “-I- I’m sorry. About- the kiss. It- I didn’t know- I didn’t know it was your first kiss, I’m- I’m so sorry.”

“Molly, _Schatz,_ please, breathe. It’s alright, it doesn’t matter- why is it so important that it was my first kiss?”

“First kisses are- they’re meant to be special, and romantic. I ruined that, Caleb, you- you only get one first kiss.”

“That is not necessarily true,” Caleb tries to tease, “If I lose my memories, just as you did.”

Wrong thing to say. Molly’s face twists, and Caleb sees the moonlight-streak of a tear down their cheek,

“Don’t joke about that. That’s- I have a lot of fears, Caleb, but- you forgetting who I am, you- you forgetting me, that ranks up there.”

“Oh. _Schatz,_ ” he imbues the nickname with as much affection as he can, “ _Prihai,_ ” in Felis, _darling,_ “I’m sorry. I won’t forget you, Mollymauk, and I- I don’t mind, about the kiss. Had it been anyone but you, perhaps I would. Perhaps Caduceus, he may have been alright, but had it been Caduceus with me, I do not think I would be here to tell the tale. I somehow don’t think that he would think of what you did.”

“Still,” Molly sniffles, “Your first kiss should have been special. With someone you love, someone like- like Caduceus-”

“He is… ah… not my type?” Caleb tries, an odd smile on his lips, “Let’s go with that. But really, I promise, it’s okay. And you know, it may not have been the ideal first kiss, such as what you are describing, but it was still special. It is something I will not forget, and it is a reminder of a wonderful day that I spent with _you,_ so- so don’t fret about it.”

Caleb lifts a hand to their cheek to brush their tears from their skin, and for a moment, Molly blinks themself into a vivid image of kissing Caleb the way he deserves.  
Sweetly, gently, _reverent,_ with strings of molten affection so bright that it scalds gold into Molly’s memory in the shape of Caleb’s mouth.

And then they blink away again, and see only Caleb, smiling up at them in the moonlight and they know that they cannot burn him like that. They cannot love him that way, when they don’t know who they’ll wake up as in the morning, Molly or Lucien. They could disappear at any moment.

Caleb strokes across their cheek once more and opens his arms to them,

“It’s alright, Molly. I like it the way it is.”

They scuffle back down and to his chest, wrapping around him fiercely, desperately, screwing their eyes shut to fight tears as they fit their horn into the gap of the angle between Caleb’s neck and shoulder and he tilts his head to their hair,

“ _Schatz,_ ” He whispers, his arms tight around them, and Molly can do little more than battle away the urge to cry.

Caleb waits, this time, until he’s sure that they’re asleep in his arms. And when he’s sure, he shuffles himself until he can kiss gently at their forehead, their nose, their hair, anywhere,

“Ah,” He murmurs between kisses, “ _Sheiße._ ”

They do not wake. They snuggle closer to him, harder, he can feel the damp of tears on their cheek and murmurs softly to them in Felis, because that is what feels right.

“ _Rîs ki ro ary’es-ra, ro anthu’o-li. Rue syr ké'ar-li, rue ki pr’rin, rue pr’rin rîs._ Mollymauk,” it comes as a whisper as he struggles to find the words amongst the limited but emotional tongue of the catfolk, “ _Rue lī…_ ah.”

There is a word to fit. Caleb knows it. But saying it, thinking it, even would be an admission, an untranslatable admission of his affections.

“ _Xes-li’o,_ ” he whispers, as quiet as he possibly can.

The shape and texture of love, soft and romantic. It is the same way that Molly feels under his hands, in his arms, and Caleb closes his eyes with their tear-streaked face imprinted on the backs of his eyelids, stained in moonlight.

 

When they wake in the morning, it is to find that Molly has rolled off to one side of the bed, close, but not curled around Caleb. They wake first, but they never have been one for getting out of bed, really- instead, they sort of stretch themself out and pick their panel off of the side, grateful that their sleeping body had gravitated to the correct side of the bed to be near it. There is a message from Clay,

 

 **From: Caduceus** **  
** Hi Molly, let me know you’re alright when you wake up. Caleb looked like he was going to stay with you, so I’m not too worried, but I’d like to know you’re okay.

 

Molly huffs a small, amused sigh and smiles,

 

**To: Caduceus**

yh im fine claeb stayd here last night so,,,

 

Clay doesn’t reply, but that’s to be expected. He’s either asleep or cooking downstairs, either would be normal for him, Molly can wait.  
They play games on their panel whilst they wait for Caleb to wake up or Clay to reply, trying to keep to the ones that _don’t_ make them want to roll around, they want to be still for Caleb. They don’t want to wake him up.

They end up doing it accidentally with a muffled victory screech, vibrating in place as Caleb comes to and they do not notice, they’re so invested with their game.  
Caleb blinks himself awake already smiling, the image of Molly on the other side of the bed with one hand clamped to their mouth and clearly excited about something- oh.

Oh, this could be wonderful.

It’s true that he wouldn’t want to wake up wound in them every morning, he’s still- he doesn’t think that he’ll ever be Molly’s level of comfortable with physical contact, but… this- this is nice.

Being together in their own space, considerate of one another but not clinging, not overwhelming, Molly’s hair frizzed slightly from the heat of the night before and the sleep, they’re lit by the warm mid-morning sun of the south from the window and Caleb could love this sight every day for the rest of his life, given the chance.

“ _Guten Morgen, Schatz._ How are you feeling?”

“ _Caleb!_ ” It comes as a sort of soft squeal, they put their panel aside and flop to their side on the bed, wide red eyes trained to Caleb’s own and a soft flush staining their white freckles a pretty pink, “I’m feeling fine. Wonderful, in fact, it looks like my angel came to bed with me last night.”

Caleb chokes out a half chuckle and reaches one hand to the space between them, patting his hand on the covers until Molly lays one of theirs over it.

“This, ah- this was nice, actually. I think I may have missed waking up to know I’m not alone.”

“You sleep across from Beau, don’t you?” Molly blinks their confusion, and _Gods,_ that’s cute,

“ _Ja,_ but I mean- before I open my eyes, I know that you are there. In the same bed, you know?”

Molly’s smile does not falter for a moment, they squeeze Caleb’s hand,

“I don’t like to sleep alone anyway, so… you could stay here? Whilst we’re here, just… with me?”

“ _Ja,_ I like that.” Caleb replies, and finds Molly immediately scooting over to wind around him, tangling themself with him under the light, warm quilt. They don’t speak, they don’t make any noise, they just cuddle up to him and stay pressed there.

Caleb cannot comprehend how they don’t hear his rabbit-quick heartbeat as it flickers against their forehead.

 

Fjord has not slept well.

He can feel the sway of the ocean under his feet, he can smell the sea salt on the breeze when his window is open to keep the air in his room from turning stale and muggy, he’s spent much of the night pacing. Even Marion’s famous rhubarb rum can’t calm his tempest heart tonight, though when he slips downstairs for air he finds her sitting in the empty main hall, still dressed from her performance and as radiant as ever, he sits to drink with her a while.

Somehow, Marion’s calm voice and enthralling personality manages to, temporarily, calm him. He got some sleep.

Not a lot.

But some is better than none, he reasons to himself, pacing in his room whilst he waits for Jester to be ready to leave. She’ll knock on his door when she is.

It feels odd, not to be dressed in his armor and padding shirt. These easy-life clothes seem ill-suited to his mind as it is, he busies himself drawing water from the air and trailing patterns with it, weaving it like string into a flower, into a star, and when there’s a knock at the door he startles so hard that the whole thing sloshes to the carpeted floor.

“Comin’!” He calls, ducking to trail his fingers across and draw the water out of the fibres. He throws it into the sink as he passes the door to the bathroom.

The knock comes again, lighter,

“Fjord? Are you okay?” Jester calls, and he can hear her rocking in concern, “Mama said you had trouble sleeping?”

“Yeah, I- just a second, Jes-” he fiddles with the lock and finally gets the door open. He fully intends to explain his problem to her, he _does,_ but then he sees her and all coherency evaporates.

Jester has always, is always, will always be beautiful, and today she has taken on a new edge of that. She’s truly hit her element back here at home, back in her mid-thigh summer dress and the wide-brimmed straw hat that Fjord _knows_ she’s borrowed from Clay.

“Uh-” Fjord starts eloquently, “Hey.”

“C’mon, I managed to get a time to see Sir Alexei today, I don’t wanna miss him!”

She takes his hand and pulls, he barely has time to close the door before she’s dragging him away, but he lets her. Alexei had been their class tutor at Maramor, when they left, he’d been on his way to head of house. A busy man, Fjord assumes, hard to get time with. But it’s very hard to say no to Jester.

She pulls him through the streets and he almost sighs like he feels at home. He has missed Port Emelle, really, truly, he has missed the turquoise-sapphire of the ocean and the dusk-orange of the town buildings, he has missed the cobbles and murals and he has missed Maramor. They don’t really come home here at all, now; Jester, Beau, and Yasha have all got a flatshare in Arcton during the academic holiday, and Fjord had been sharing with Molly and Clay in Hyaffi before they returned to the academy for the year.

He has missed this place that he once called home.

He hates that it makes him sick now.

 

“Ah, Yasha, Nott,” Caleb peeks around the door to the upstairs dining room, “Mollymauk and I are going shopping, and we were wondering if you would like to come? Or, if not, if you need anything whilst we are out?”

“ _Jewellery,_ ” Nott says immediately, with a passionate kind of venom behind it, “Any kind of pretty shiny thing. I collect them. Hold on, I think I have my coin purse somewhere…”

“ _Nein,_ call it a gift if I find anything.” Caleb smiles at her, and she beams right back, needle-sharp teeth bright in the sunlight, “Yasha?”

“Ah- yes, actually- is Molly with you? It’s sort of… special.”

“Um, _nein,_ not this moment, but I can go and tell them you need them? They are just dressing.”

“Please,” Yasha gives him a quick smile, “Thank you.”

 

Molly is halfway through dressing when Caleb comes in. It seems they’ve decided not to bind, today, they have one of their soft banded bras on, the ones without straps, and they’re flicking through their folded collection of dresses half-naked, tail slowly flicking through the air. Caleb is far past embarrassment at their nudity of any level, after last night. There is not much more intimacy past bathing together, short of physically touching them.

“Anyone coming?” They ask without looking up, and Caleb shakes his head for a second too long before he realises they can’t see, and sits on the bed instead,

“ _Nein,_ but Nott wants something shiny, and Yasha would like to see you before we leave. Something private, I think.”

Molly hums and stands again, dragging some semi-shiny trail of fabric up with them,

“Must be important. I’ll go and see her whilst _you’re_ getting dressed- what do you think of this?”

They turn to hold the dress out to him, and Caleb must admit that it’s nice. It seems to be some kind of silk, or taffeta, slightly ruffled in the skirt with embroidered lines and designs in gold, a dark green that shifts to teal and blue in the light,

“It is very pretty, but I do worry for the heat. Dark colours tend to trap it, you may be best wearing something lighter.”

Molly makes a noise of pleased surprise and nods,

“I definitely didn’t think about that. You’re _very_ right, I have _just_ the thing-”

They duck down and come back up with another dress, white this time, a sleeveless bodice and somewhat fluffy skirt that fades to a light cyan at the hem. There are twin sequined peacock feathers curving where a sash would sit and it’s- it’s beautiful. But it’s so painfully _Molly_ that Caleb can’t hold back his little surprised laugh, even as Molly’s excitement falls from their face,

“Yeah it’s- um- probably a bit much. Sorry-”

They turn to put it away and Caleb springs from the bed to their side to take their face in his hands,

“ _Nein,_ no, Mollymauk, please, you’re beautiful-”

He doesn’t notice, as the words drop from his lips, but he notices the way Molly’s eyes widen and curses his own slippery tongue,

“The dress is- is beautiful. I was- I’m sorry, if I hurt you, I was just… amazed, that this dress is so… you.”

One of Molly’s hands has found its way to resting over the back of Caleb’s against their cheek,

“You- um- you think I’m- pretty?”

“Is that a word you would like to be known as?”

“Yes. I think. Yes.”

“Mollymauk, you are by far the prettiest person I have ever met.”

Molly sort of sighs and collapses in against Caleb’s chest, tucking their head carefully under his chin. All of the words they want to use involve telling Caleb that they love him, but even they’re not really sure about _that._

“Thank you.” They manage eventually, when Caleb’s hands find their warm place against the bare skin of their back. He smiles above them, they feel the minute shift of muscle in his chin,

“It’s only the truth.”

They draw back, eventually, with a faint buzzing feeling in their shoulders that they don’t recognise, but it feels good. Maybe it comes from their total satisfaction at life in this moment.

They’re not really sure how life could get any better.

 

Yasha pulls them into the quiet hall when they go to see her,

“Your dress is nice,” comes the first words from her mouth, and Molly beams at the compliment,

“Thank you! What do you need?”

“I- um-” Yasha stammers her way through another five seconds of filler before she takes a heaving sigh. Ah. Something for Beau, then.

“What are you getting her?”

“I want to get her a necklace? But a special one, one of the ones that you put a… a… crystal in. For my colour.”

“ _Ooh,_ ” Molly’s eyes widen in glee, “You’re _finally_ marking her? Only took you a year!”

“Leave off it,” Yasha waves a hand at them, “Can you find it or not?”

“I’ll try my best, darling. Want upsies.” and they make grabby hands until she puts her hands to their hips- Gods, she can almost get her fingers right around their waist- and lifts them so they can kiss her cheek. When she plops them back to the floor, looking slightly more ruffled and far more satisfied, she even manages to smile for them, met with their brilliance.

“Be gentle with Caleb,” She warns, and watches the light flash over Molly’s eyes with the tactile shift of their head,

“Never.” They promise her, and they’re darting away before she can come close to chiding them, accustomed to her routines and times now. Yasha watches them go with a little snort of amusement. They’ve grown so much in the time she’s known them, and she is so proud.

It doesn’t stop them being a little shit, but hey, everyone has flaws.

 

Caleb steps out of his door to find a cloud of Mollymauk rushing around him and settling in his hands, the solidity of their waist against his palms a stark contrast to the breeze they’d arrived in.

“Hi.” They chirrup, arms around his neck, “Wanna braid my hair before we go?”

“Are you asking me to braid your hair, or if I _want_ to braid your hair?” Caleb can’t _not_ smile at them, they’re adorable,

“Bit of both. Wouldn’t say no, if you wanted to do it.”

Caleb pretends to think about it. It’s really an easy decision, any chance for this kind of intimacy with Molly is a chance he could never pass up, but he enjoys teasing them about it. Only when they wriggle in his hands does he laugh,  
  
“ _Ja,_ okay, I will braid your hair. You are so impatient, Mollymauk!”

They chuckle, and Caleb feels a momentary swell of pride that they know his tone so well as to pick up on his teasing. They duck in to butt their forehead to his, gently, and draw away again, pulling from their place in his grip and catching one of his hands as they turn away from him,

“Come on, I have clips in my room.”

 

They leave half an hour later through the back door. Jester’s mother is entertaining for the day, and the group have promised to stay as quiet and out of the way as possible, so it’s not too much trouble to slip away. Molly’s hair, once more, is braided, their hand in Caleb’s as they skim through the streets of Port Emelle.

There are so many shops selling so many things, trinkets and jewellery and soaps and all of the choice makes Caleb’s head spin. Molly has to sit him on a bench at one point, shaped like the top of an anchor and inscribed with the history of Port Emelle, Caleb collapses onto one end and Molly sits some distance from him, patient as ever whilst he recovers.

“This town is… a lot.” He manages to Molly eventually, receives a mute nod in return. Molly’s eyes are raking what they can see, nooks, crannies, alleys, they spot a particularly interesting alley with a stream of people and look back to Caleb. He’s halfway through a breathing exercise.

“Hey,” they murmur, soft as they slip a little closer, just enough that they don’t have to raise their voice to be heard in the clutter, “I’m just going to check that alley out. Back in a sec’, okay?”

Caleb’s eyes blink open to meet theirs, and he nods, doesn’t stop his breathing but keeps it going. Good boy.

Molly slips to their feet and darts over to the opening, pausing once to look over their shoulder to Caleb before they slip down it.

It’s dim, in here, but no less busy than the main street, for its size. There seems to be a barber shop, a florist, and some way down- perfect, exactly what they’re looking for- a bookshop-café, something Caleb would like. They can see the upstairs windows, lit with sunlight over the tops of the buildings on the other side of the alley, books stacked on shelves clearly visible within. It looks like exactly Caleb’s kind of place.

They come back to him just as he’s standing, dusting himself off,

“Sorry.” He apologises as they slip their hand into his, they shake their head,

“ _Nein,_ ” With the worst possible accent, they stand on their tiptoes to kiss at Caleb’s cheek, “Feeling better?”

“I am. Did you find anything interesting?”

“I did, actually!” Molly vibrates with their excitement, the pinprick static buzz creeping down their neck and across their shoulders, “Come on, I’ll show you.”

They pull him down the alley and watch his face over their shoulder as he spots the bookshop. An excitement they’ve never seen glows in his eyes, they push the door open and the second he steps over the threshold he shivers and settles, like he’s never been comfortable in his skin before now.

“A bookstore.” They hear him murmur, watching his eyes rove across just this entrance hall, already full of old and new books alike, “You found me a bookstore.”

“It looks like it’s about three storeys.” They say in agreement, “More upstairs.”

Caleb could cry. He hasn’t been in a bookstore since he last saw his parents, at the very end of the Solace year, when he’d spent a month at home recovering.

His mother had sat with him in their local place, as he thumbed through the shelves. He had been non-verbal, but she had told him of the way he lit up there, like he would one day be whole again.  
He doesn’t think so. But he knows how he felt. How he feels. Molly is watching him curiously, smiling, and Caleb steps in to bundle them into a hug. They giggle against his shoulder, Caleb squeezes them as tight as he can,

“Thank you.”

 

Molly trails him around the bookshop quietly. Some places, they check the shelves a short distance away, like the astrology section. Others, they lean against the wall and watch him immerse himself in the books.

And then there’s the history room.

Where the sunlight pours through the window and makes the dust shine like glitter in mid-air, and the room is warm and smells of old books and knowledge, and Caleb steps into a sunbeam to inspect the leather cover of an old book detailing the unspoken legends of the Gaian Heroes.

His hair glows gold, the leather fits against his hand perfectly, his smile is small and soft and he looks so at peace, and Molly has never felt this kind of sweet, warm cocktail in their life. A mix of contentment and happiness and deep love, Caleb glances from the book to them and smiles and-

And something in them _bursts._

Like someone has drawn fingertips down their shoulder blades, that static feeling amps up and explodes out, they see the gold flash of magical light against Caleb’s skin and in the reflection in his eyes.

His eyes, wide and shocked, his face fallen loose.

“ _Molly,_ ” he whispers, tone utterly reverent, he sets the book on a shelf and crosses to them slowly, “You have- you have _wings._ ”

“What?”

“ _Wings,_ ” Caleb says again, and one hand disappears over Molly’s shoulder. There’s a sensation, like a distant gentle touch, and the edge of a translucent gold wing comes into Molly’s sight, “Like a- ah- like a pixie?”

“ _Oh,_ ” Molly says quietly, because they’ve heard of this. They’ve heard of the fae tongue hellborn sprouting wings when they’re over-exerting their magic, or deathly afraid, or so happy that they can’t contain it any longer. They’ve never had this before.

“You have _wings,_ ” Caleb says quietly, again, and Molly-

They break into giggles. Slowly, getting wilder and brighter and they take Caleb’s face in their hands,

“Wings!” They tell him, “Because of you!”

“ _Was?_ ” Caleb’s hands come to their cheeks, automatically mirroring,

“You! This happens when my kind of hellborn is so happy they can’t hold it in, Caleb- Caleb, I’ve never been so happy. Caleb-” And they can’t think of the right words so they cut themself off by pressing in on their tiptoes and kissing Caleb’s cheeks and nose, wherever they can reach in soft little kisses. And when they drop back to draw breath, Caleb ducks down and does the same, kissing constellations into their freckles and brushing his thumbs against the sides of their neck. He rests his forehead to theirs, when he feels he’s created a whole new night sky on their cheeks, grinning and sucking breath through his happiness.

 

Molly’s wings fade as they leave the shop, and though Caleb mentions it with some disappointment, they aren’t phased,

“They come and go.” They tell him with a smile, lacing their fingers with his, “It’d be a pain to have them all the time. I’ve never had them before, you know.”

“No?” Caleb is wide-eyed as Molly pulls him through the streets, smiling,

“No. First time, and for you!”

It crushes the air from Caleb’s lungs in a wonderful way,

“Molly,” he says, tugging to halt them so that he can pull them into a hug, crushing and tight and consuming, “Molly,” again, because all other words fail him, “My Mollymauk.”

“My Caleb.” Molly agrees into his shoulder, and wraps their arms around his waist.

 

They find a cute little store selling soaps, jellies, and bath bombs, and it takes all of Molly’s self control not to buy out the whole place. They stick close to Caleb’s side to contain themself, keeping an arm around his waist to hold themself to him as they wander between items.

“Set me a limit?” They request, staring over the little flower-shaped soaps. Caleb kisses the top of their head,

“What kind?”

“Of how many things I can buy? Or I’ll go overboard.”

“Um,” Caleb looks from them to the mounds of bath bombs, “What is a… good amount?”

“More than one. Less than ten. Any of that.” Molly cuddles closer and for a moment, Caleb’s brain is nothing but static,

“Three,” he says automatically, and Molly nods against his chest, he feels the soft scratch of their hair on cotton,

“Three. Alright. Thank you.”

They trail Caleb around the store, looking at the balm bars and the face masks and the bath bombs, and eventually, they settle themself on a choice of a glittery bath bomb, one of the cute little flower soaps, and some odd, soap-looking thing that Molly tells Caleb is a balm bar. To emphasise this as they leave, they rub the little heart-shaped thing on the back of their hand, and display the glitter it leaves behind.

“I’m shiny,” They proclaim as they tuck the bar away, “Like a star!”

Caleb laughs at them kindly, ducks and bumps his head to theirs,

“The brightest star in the sky. My Mollymauk.”

And Molly, in that moment, knows that they are in love.

  


Jester gets the tournament message halfway through their coffee meetup with Alexei.

She knows the pattern for an official announcement ping when it vibrates against her chest, and she ignores it, at first.  
Alexei has hardly changed since they left, perhaps his hair has grey streaks now, perhaps his facial hair is a little more untamed, but he is very much the same. He still offers to buy the coffee and cake as they enter the shop, still protests when Jester darts ahead to do it first, still has that same smile when they sit at the table,

“So!” He says, jovial, “You’re back in Port Emelle! How’s the academy?”

“Only for a week and a bit.” Jester moans, and Fjord gently shoves her shoulder,

“Hey, don’t complain about stuff that ain’t bad- the academy’s great, Alexei. They’re very kind an’ understandin’ in their regimens, but they still drive y’ to get better. It’s- uh- it’s a lot of fun. Right, Jes?”

“Hm?” Jester can feel the weight of her panel with its notification, sitting, waiting, “Oh! Yeah! And the teachers are really nice and we have dorm rooms and teams and we can work on our weapons but it’s not like here where-”

“Breathe.” Fjord reminds gently, and Jester takes a huge breath,

“-where we had whole workshops and special training, I mean, we do get a workshop, but it’s more of a _oh you do it in your free time_ sort of thing you know? I still haven’t managed to get the two crystal thing working though.”

The knowledge that her panel is there, waiting, it itches.

Fjord startles at some unseen thing, and _he_ withdraws _his_ panel from his pocket,  
“Sorry,” He tells Alexei politely, “Global notification.”

“No worries.” Alexei flashes a brief smile, and turns his attention back to Jester, “Did you manage to master the resurrection, then?”

“Well, to an extent…” Jester frowns, Fjord’s eyes widening drawing her attention, “I can get it sometimes, but not always… haven’t had to- what _is it,_ Fjord?”

“Tournament sign-ups are open!” Fjord waves his panel at her, “D’you think Molly’s seen? They wanna sign up this year, right?”

“Oh! They do! So do I!”

Alexei laughs at their shared excitement, and they both turn back to him, prickling with shame. He seems unbothered that they’d forgotten him, still smiling over the rim of his coffee mug,  
“If you need to get back to your friends…” He drawls, and Jester shakes her head, slapping gently at Fjord’s hand til he puts the panel away,

“No! It’s no rush, we can stay a bit longer.”

“Excellent!” Alexei sits a little straighter in his chair, “So, tell me about the resurrection!”

Jester launches into a detailed analysis straight away, leaving Fjord to sit back and smile as he watches her animated excitement.  
Molly will be overjoyed when they tell them about the sign-ups.

 

As soon as they’re back in the chateau, Molly pulls Caleb up the stairs, into their bathroom, and begins stripping without any kind of second thought.  
Caleb considers himself used to it, by now, sits on the dry end of the bath and waits for them to sort themself out, reading though his newest book.

“Caleb! Look!” Molly waves for his attention, then they plonk their purple bath bomb into the water. There’s a few slow seconds, and then clouds of blue-and-purple bubbles begin to ripple out, a cloud of lavender spreading under the surface. Molly laughs delightedly, kneeling on the cold tile already naked, their tail waving circles behind them,

“Look at that,” They say near-reverently, “Isn’t it beautiful?”

“ _Ja,_ ” Says Caleb, his eyes on Molly’s face, “They- ah- _ja._ Beautiful.”

He catches himself in time, and Molly doesn’t seem to notice, paying attention to the little ball of bubbles as it turns in the water and sends up columns.

It takes a few minutes before Molly can climb in, and when they do, they sweep a handful of the bubbles aside to show Caleb the milky-lilac colour of the bathwater, little bits of glitter shining on the surface and on their skin. Caleb reaches out and runs a hand through their hair gently,

“It’s lovely.”

“Are you sure you don’t want in?” Molly quirks an eyebrow, “I think you’d look good covered in glitter.”  
__  
And nothing else, they add in the privacy of their own mind. Caleb blushes as though he can hear it.  
  
“ _Nein,_ I don’t think that it would suit. Besides, you should enjoy this. It’s yours- I was not the one that cracked my skull like an egg, hm?”

“Shut up.” Molly grins playfully, bumps their head to his arm as he cards through their hair again.

“ _Molly!_ ” Jester’s voice. She does not wait at the door to their room, and they just about have time to scoot down in the water before she’s in their bathroom.

“Molly- oh, hi, Caleb! Where’s Molly?”

Caleb, sitting on the edge of the bathtub, gestures to the little bit of Mollymauk still visible above the water. They’re up to just under their eyes, and they bubble a greeting at Jester.

“Oh, there you are. Anyway! Um! You need to check your panel! We just got the notification, they’ve opened sign-ups for the tournament! Fjord, Beau, and me are already all signed up!”  
  
Molly’s eyes widen and they look to Caleb, bubbling furiously.

“ _Ja,_ okay, I’ll…” Caleb, understanding perfectly, pets the top of their head before he wanders into the other room in search of their panel, leaving Jester to eye the Molly-lump and give them a _look._

“Moving in quickly, are we?”  
_  
Bubblebubble_ , indignant, frowning, Jester grins,

“It’s okay, Molly!” And she crouches beside the bath, “Get some! I can ask mama to get someone to replace the sheets…”

 _Bubblebubblebubblebubblebubble_ , frantic, wide-eyed Molly shaking their head under the water and she laughs, straightening up. With perfect timing, too, as Caleb comes back in with Molly’s panel in his hand,

“I found it- why do you put your things in the most awkward places, Mollymauk?”

“I’ll leave you to your sign-up and otherwise!” Jester waves, winks, “Okay, bye!”

She draws the word out as she leaves, cutting it off only once the door to Molly’s room is closed.

Molly sits back up, gasping for breath,  
“Thank the _Gods,_ alright, um- can you check the notification whilst I dry my hands?”

There’s sloshing as they move without waiting for an answer, but Caleb doesn’t mind tapping and opening the sign-up screen for them, keying in a few basic details like their name, their age, their school. He hands them their panel as they slosh back to him, and runs a hand down their back, half enamoured with the way the water gathers in droplets. Molly shivers, half distracted with keying their details into the sign-up sheet,  
“Are you entering into the tournament?” They ask almost idly; almost every third-year does, there’s nothing to be lost from it, after all.  
“Ah, _nein,_ I… I will not be entering. I don’t want… _ja_.”

Molly looks up, wide-eyed,

“Oh.” They say quietly, “So you’ll be staying here?”

“ _Ja,_ ” Caleb replies nervously, Molly’s face is… sad, and he doesn’t like it.

“Three weeks without you, Caleb- alright, I’m gonna pull you down, make sure you’ve got your balance.”

Caleb steadies himself against the bathtub, and Molly’s hand finds his collar, tugs him town toward them. He still half-overbalances, and one hand slips to the water to brace himself on their thigh. Molly pays it no mind, just straightens up a little so that they can kiss his cheek and press their face the side of his neck for a few long seconds. Caleb can hear- and feel- them taking a deep, steadying breath.

“Three weeks. Hm.”

And then they’re releasing him and he sits back up again, mourning the loss of the heat against his palm.

“Don’t have too much fun without me, now, will you?” they ask, smiling, but their voice lacks that genuine quality of amusement, and that… honestly concerns Caleb,

“It isn’t that long, _Schatz,_ ” he assures, “And you will be busy for much of it.”

“Yeah, but…” Molly sighs, scoots up the bath until they can rest the dry part of their horn against Caleb’s leg, “I just got you back, you know? I don’t know. I don’t want to lose you again.”

“Don’t get sentimental.” Caleb says, being sentimental, stroking across their hair and trailing his fingertips down their neck.

“I’m not.” Molly lies, frowning as they tap away on their panel, completing their application. When they’re finished, they hand it to Caleb and turn to rest their chin on his leg, pressing against his hand. They sigh, but don’t talk again, and Caleb suspects that they would have fallen asleep there if he hadn’t jostled them,

“If you dry up, we can take a nap before we eat, _ja?_ You seem tired.”

Molly hums, but obliges, drains the bathtub and climbs out to fall into the towel that Caleb holds out for them, they shuffle off to dry themself whilst Caleb rinses the purple from the tub.

When he comes into their room, Molly is curled on their bed, dressed in loose pyjamas and already asleep, at first glance. They open their eyes, though, as Caleb sits on the side of the bed,

“Caleb,” they coo, wriggling toward him, and he chuckles as he lays down. They wind around him, set their head against his shoulder, and he squeezes them gently.

“Molly,” He replies, quiet and soft and sleepy. They have already fallen asleep, he can tell by the steady path of their breathing. They smell of lavender and sandalwood and home, and their rhythmic heartbeat against his side lulls him away, too.

He falls asleep in the afternoon sunbeams, holding Molly to his side.


	9. Long enough to call it courage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Celebratory chapter for me getting wifi back! The plot begins.

“Thought y’ were gonna get laid this holiday, Molly?” Beau raises an eyebrow at the accused as they step into the dining room behind Caleb, yawning, rubbing their eyes with one hand and holding the back of Caleb’s shirt with the other. For guidance, they’d told him, bleary-eyed in the hall.  
They do not grace Beau with a verbal reply, just a gesture halfway between a heart and _fuck you._

“It is hard to _get laid,_ ” Caleb imitates her voice poorly, “With an unwilling watcher in the room.”

“Yeah, heard about your fall,” Beau nods to Caleb and speaks to Molly, “Y’alright?”

“Not terrible.” Molly flashes a grin and picks themself a seat across from Beau. In the kitchen, they can hear Jester and Clay chattering as they cook.

“Shame, thought it might knock some sense into y’.” Beau raises her eyebrows and takes a dramatic sip of whatever she’s got in a glass. Knowing the Lavish Chateau as they do, Molly assumes that it’s some kind of wine. The door opens again, and Nott comes scrambling in with Yasha at her heels, skittering into place and watching with inquisitive eyes as Yasha slips into the seat beside Beau,

“Wine?” she asks, and Beau knocks the bottle toward her gently,

“Rosé.”

“Ooh,” Molly leans across the table, “Can I have some?”

“Suppose.” Beau rolls her eyes, and Yasha gives a soft, amused breath as she pours a glass for herself and Molly, “Are they almost done with the food? Jester said six…”

“Almost,” It’s Fjord to answer as he slips in from the kitchen looking a little frazzled, “Couple more minutes.”

He sits at the empty head of the table in a seat that he knows is designated his. At the other end, Marion’s chair sits and will remain empty- she is working, this evening, and cannot join them for tea.

 

Jester and Clay eventually make their way in with their arms full of food bowls, a handful of empty plates between them, they set the food in the middle of the table and hand the plates to each of them to begin loading up. Caleb is shockingly for this, he’s far more comfortable when he can separate his plate out by colour. Baked yam in purple, or green? It’s a hard decision, but he eventually settles on purple, between the cherry tomatoes and his stuffed green pepper. There is very little blue food, after all, he still makes an attempt at the colour wheel. He finishes it with a healthy spoonful of quinoa and begins to eat, slow and quiet, so quiet in fact that he finds Molly’s fingertips ghosting against his knee,

“Are you okay?” They ask, voice low and subtle under the cover of their friends chattering. Caleb gives them a smile, genuine and contented and switches his fork to his other hand so he can lace his fingers with theirs under the table. He can’t reply with a mouthful of food, that would be impolite.

Molly seems to understand, squeezing his hand once gently and releasing him to eat,

“So, Molly, Caleb, what did you get up to?” Jester’s voice shocks through the two’s little bubble, “What’d you buy? I mean, aside from the bath bomb.”

“Mollymauk found, um, a bookstore? In a back alley?”

“Oh, Turning Page?” Jester bristles excitedly, “Isn’t it so sweet?”

“ _Ja,_ it was… certainly special, hm?” he looks to Molly and finds a pale blush dusting their face, an odd, silly sort of smile at their lips. Jester, naturally, does not miss this either,

“ _Special?_ What does that mean? Molly?”

Caleb lets the silence beat a second, in case Molly is to tell them about their wings. When they don’t speak at first, Caleb readies an excuse about a fine leather book cover and is about ready to let it drop.

 

And then Molly taps at his leg, hand palm-up under the table and their eyes on his.

 

Carefully, gently, Caleb takes it and Molly allows themself to blink the memory of the bookstore into place around them, the dust dancing in the sunbeams haloing Caleb’s hair in gold and making the blue of his eyes glow.  
They turn from his face to look at Jester, knowing fine well that the odd buzzing sensation at their shoulders was their wings re-materialising.

The shock on their friends faces is incredible.

Jester has clapped her hands to her cheeks and looks so excited that she might explode, Beau’s jaw has hit the floor rather inelegantly, both Fjord and Yasha look as though they’re in awe, and Clay looks… almost smug. Shocked, sure, but smug, too.  
They’ll deal with that later.

“ _You found your wings!_ ” Jester squeals, almost upending the table in her rush to stand and run around the table to hug them. They barely have time to let go of Caleb and stand before she’s on them, arms around their neck and giggling wildly, “Your wings, your wings, your wings!”

Molly chuckles right back at her,  
“My wings.” They agree, and when Jester releases them, they turn right back to holding Caleb’s hand.

Their wings remain bright at their shoulder blades, and Caleb has to force himself to focus on his baked yam instead of his Mollymauk, they pick idly at their own food with that same silly smile on their face and Gods, Caleb loves them.

And for now, at least, they are his. He may not be able to share his heart with them in the way he wants, but he can cuddle them close to him at night, he can wake up beside them in the morning, he can feel their pulse in their fingertips and know they are alive. They are _his,_ for now, until they find someone to fall for and Caleb is battled back into retreating his affections from them.

It’s alright.

 

There’s gentle chatter over the table once they settle from the excitement of Molly’s wings, and Caleb finds himself genuinely disappointed that he can’t run his fingertips over them as they fade away. He eats quietly, sneaking looks at Molly out of the corner of his eye as they chew their way through their food between active conversation with Beau and Yasha.

Jester and Fjord get themselves into a conversation, quietly,  
“About… that thing,” Jester gently taps Fjord’s head, “Has it been… quiet?”

“Quiet,” Fjord agrees, “But still there.”

 _Still here._ Confirms the tempest in his skull, quiet, and smug,   
  
“But you’re not- um- it’s not taking you away?”

Her eyes are wide, she sets a hand over his and Fjord feels that familiar shiver down his spine, like a gentle scratch against his head, he smiles at her,

“I don’t think so, no,” there is no sound in the back of his head correcting him, “I think… I think we’re okay.”

“Good,” Jester smiles back at him and pulls her hands back to her food, and immediately there’s a rage in the back of Fjord’s head,

 _You_ **_will_ ** _follow my orders, Vessel._

It _hurts,_ a strike of confused pain in his head and he winces against the light as it brightens, sudden,

“Fjord?” Jester looks at him, alarmed,

_You will be needed, whilst we are here. You will-_

Jester puts her hand gently to his head, and the voice stops, her eyes are wide when they meet his,

“‘M alrigh’, but- uh- I think I might have to leave… soon. Dunno.”

“Again? Do- will you be- the vase, again?” She frowns, and Fjord gives a soft snort. Every time it’s brought up, he can taste, can feel the seawater burn at the back of his throat.

And then he remembers.

The fragment of a pot that he’d crammed into his pocket so long ago and forgotten about, the one he carries everywhere for no real reason. The one sitting in the side pouch of his bag.

“Hey, Jes, uh- Marion- she’s… knowledgeable, ‘bout history an’ artifacts o’ the sort, yeah?”

“Sometimes! She reads a lot, when she isn’t working.”

“D’you think I could ask her about somethin’, t’morrow? I, uh… I wanna know what’s goin’ on, see?”

“Oh, totally!” Jester grins, and for a moment, Fjord smiles back and everything feels right. And then Jester’s smile slowly fades.

“Fjord?” She asks, tentative, and her eyes have slid from him to her food, her hand laid over his,

“Jester?”

“When you go, this time, um-” and her hand leaves his to run nervously through her own hair, “When you go, can I come with you? Would- would it allow that?”

Fjord pauses as he waits for the tempest to decide, he can hear it thinking and humming and considering like a thunderstorm in the back of his mind,

 _I am sure she will not do any harm to come with us._ It concedes, and Fjord is halfway between shocked and horrified. Jester’s eyes come to meet his,

“No,” he lies, “It won’t let you.”

There’s a laugh like crackling fire and rushing waves from the thing calling his head home, and Fjord has to fight not to wince,

“Oh. okay.” Jester looks crestfallen. That hurts Fjord almost as much as the raucous laughter rebounding in his head does,

 _Liar,_ hisses the voice, and Fjord swallows as he leans down and kisses Jester’s horn,

“I’m sorry, Jes.”

“Just… come back safe, okay?”

“I’ll try.” he promises her gently, “I always do.”

 

When the group retires to bed that evening, it’s somewhat drunk, following an uneventful game of ring of fire. Caduceus is the first to drop, having been only on tea for the majority of the night, shortly followed by both Jester and Fjord, who slip away together as Jester’s face crumples at something or other. Fjord, tipsy, makes apologies and drags her away to his bed to sleep entwined for the night.  
Yasha and Nott disappear soon after, an awkward farewell to Beau who returns it just as awkwardly, and when they’re gone, Molly gives a soft snort.

“How can you _still_ be this much of a disaster? You spend pretty much your whole life by her side.”

“It’s- shut the fuck up, Molly, you asshole! Look it’s just- hard? Weird? Fuck you, you got so upset when Caleb wasn’t talkin’ to y’ that you made _me_ hug you.”

“I count that as a pride point.” Molly points their bottle in her direction, “You’re only embarrassing yourself.”

“ _Nein,_ ” Caleb disagrees, flashing Beau a smirk of solidarity, “You were so lonely without me that you went to Beauregard _bones and claws_ for reassurance? _Mollymauk._ ”

His tone is teasing, and it has the desired reaction- Molly flushes fiercely and turns silent in stutters as they try to formulate a response and instead short-circuit at the sweet, affectionate smirk on Caleb’s face.

It’s for them. It’s all for them.

There’s a soft buzz, like fingertips ghosting over their shoulders, and Beau bursts into peals of laughter. Caleb’s eyes light up, figuratively and literally, as Molly’s winge re-materialise,

“Ah,” he says, reaching out to run his fingers over the pretty stained-glass patterns, “They’re back.”

Molly chuckles, half nerves, half tipsy, they knock back the last of their wine,

“I think,” they pick carefully, “We should go to bed. Before I clear out Marion’s store of wine.”

Beau groans and stretches across the table,  
“I hate it, but- yeah. No, I agree- time t’ sleep. I’ll see y’in the mornin’ if I’m unlucky.”

“Fuck you, Beau.” Molly grins jovially, standing, and receives a half-glare, half-smile in return,

“Fuck you, Molly.”

Molly bows and turns to Caleb,

“Coming?”

“ _Ja,_ ” he stands, waving to Beau absently, his eyes on Molly’s wings, “Coming. _Gute Nacht,_ Beauregard.”

“Night.” She waves, and the two of them trail out and off toward the bedrooms.

 

The moonlight comes in slats through Molly’s window, staining the whole room in ethereal purple-white light. It is Neon, larger in the sky tonight and fully illuminated in her reflections of the sun, Pompus sits heavily on the horizon and sinks every second. Caleb knows the paths of the moon tonight like he knows the smile on Molly’s face and the freckles across their cheeks; he could pick them out in the pitch-black.

Molly is halfway through changing when they look over to him, eyes wide and colour drained by the dim-pale light of the moon, their nightshirt still settling across their- now wing-less- shoulders.

“Caleb?” They ask, and their voice is soft, “You alright?”

He has been staring, without realising, hasn’t moved from the hall to the room and they cross to him like a shadow, taking his hands from his chest,

“You don’t have to sleep here if you don’t want to. I don’t want to pressure you.”

Oh, Molly. Always so sweet and understanding, but they can never know that this is all Caleb wants.  
He pulls one of their hands in his, up until he can kiss their knuckles and he makes an attempt to meet their eyes as he does. They smile, and he can’t stop himself smiling back, his lips pressed to their skin.

“Good.” They murmur, and wind their arms around his neck as he releases their hand. In turn, Caleb’s hands find their hips and, unprompted, the two begin to shift around the room in a slow, dancing pattern.  
After a few moments of shifting out of beat with one another, Caleb begins to hum. It’s an old, familiar song, one that even Molly knows and they lean into him, resting their head at his shoulder as they sway,

“The Ballad of Lorelei,” They murmur, equal parts amused and adoring, “I didn’t know you knew the story.”

“ _Ja,_ ” Caleb says, in tune of the song, “They are a key his-tor-y point of Solazone, and I enjoy the happy ending.”

Molly gives a soft snort and smiles, squishing their arms around his neck a little tighter for a moment. They continue to sway in the beat of the song, and as it draws to the end, they draw to the bed.

“Is there such a thing as a happy ending, Caleb?” Molly asks as they climb under the covers, Caleb kicking his pants and binder off behind him as he goes. He doesn’t know how to make the words of a reply, so he instead scrambles down and pulls Molly in too, flush against him in his arms,

“I hope that there is.” he finds his voice, eventually, and kisses the top of their head, “I will make one for you.”

Molly murmurs something that Caleb either does not catch, or does not understand, they bury their face in the fabric at his collarbone and wind tight around him and he can only smile into their hair.

 

 

Jester pulls Fjord along by the hand to her mother’s quarters gone midnight. There’s a good chance that Marion will be asleep by now, but- they have to try. It can’t wait.  
Fjord can’t wait.

It’s beginning to grow impatient.

“Mama?” Jester calls quietly as she raps at the door, Fjord’s fingers twitching between her own, “Mama, are you awake?”

There’s a quiet pause where, heart in her mouth, Jester briefly thinks that she’s out of luck and her mother has gone to sleep. And then there’s soft shuffling on the other side of the door, some clicking, and Marion’s face appears with exhaustion in her eyes,

“Jester? Is everything alright? It’s so late…”

“Yes! No? Maybe? It’s alright _now_ but, um, it could be not alright very soon but it isn’t me it’s Fjord and you’re really smart-”

“Breathe,” Fjord reminds, and Jester takes a huge breath,

“You know a lot about history and old things, right, mama?”

There’s another brief pause, and then the door opens wider,

“Come in,” Marion invites, turning and tying the silk of her robe tighter around her, “I’ve read a lot, yes. Is this important?”

“Yes! Probably! I think so?”

Jester pulls Fjord in behind her and the door clicks shut, covering the nervous pounding of his heart in his ears. Were it not for Jester’s hand in his own, he is sure he would have fled by now.  
  
Fjord has never been in Marion’s chambers before.  
The whole room is draped in crushed red velvet, silk, chains of rubies that trail across mirrors and windows and walls like little red raindrops.  
Jester pulls Fjord to sit on a plush sofa, and Marion sits at the edge of her bed,

“What do you need my help with?”

Jester looks to Fjord, quiet for the first time and it takes a few seconds for Fjord to find his tongue,

“I- uh- I have… this. An’ I think it’s important,” as he speaks, he plucks the fragment of the vase from his pocket, the one that he’d first found himself apparently consuming. He hands it to Jester, first, “I wanna know what it is. Jester said you might have an idea.”

Jester inspects it herself, then hands it off to her mother.  
It’s a piece of vase, and that’s it, as far as Jester can tell. There’s some odd writing in gold inlay on the sea-green of the ceramic, and something about it definitely seems weird and familiar to her, but she can’t _read_ it. Hopefully, she thinks, as Marion’s fingers brush her own, they will get their answers.

Marion takes the fragment and studies it, momentarily.

 

Jester has never seen her mother blanche before.

 

She has never seen Marion’s cheeks any shade other than rich ruby, but as her eyes find the gold inlay of the foreign text, her whole face turns a dusty rose as the blood rushes away and her mouth and eyes drop open wide.  
There is an expression of terrified horror there, it lasts only a few moments before she regains her composure but it’s enough to shake even Jester,

“What it is? What’s wrong? Mama?”

“I- ah- Jester. This is… this could be something very big. And very bad. But I am not _sure,_ do you understand? I need to talk to some friends, I need to be sure- Fjord, how did you get this?”

“I, uh… threw it up.” Fjord’s tongue runs across his tusks nervously, and Marion frowns,

“What?”

“I sorta blacked out? I woke up about a hundred and fifty, two hundred miles from Solazone, bits o’ that pot broken in front o’ me, my hands cut t’ shreds. An’ then I was- I was sick. An’ it was like brine, like seawater, an’ there was more of that pot in there, like- like I’d _eaten_ it. I don’t remember. It’s happened a couple times.”

The horror and terror behind Marion’s eyes only strengthens into a tempest, she tries so hard to look calm for her darling daughter but Jester can read her like a book,

“What do you think it is, mama?” She asks, and her voice is quiet. She is unused to her mother’s fear. She is scared of it.

Marion stands and comes to her, ducks to press a kiss to the crown of her head,

“If it is as I fear, we can deal with it later. For now, go to bed, Jester, get some sleep. Nothing can hurt you here.”

Jester feels tears sting at the edge of her eyes and she wraps her free arm around her mother’s waist, feeling, again, as though she is a small, scared child,

“Promise?” she asks, voice small, and Marion smiles,

“I promise.”

 

There is nothing else any of them can do. Marion bids them goodnight and they leave, trailing back to the rooms and pausing outside Jester’s door where, finally, she looses her hand from Fjord’s to press onto her tiptoes and kiss him sweetly,

“It’ll be alright,” she promises with her hands set to his cheeks, “Mama will figure it out.”

“I hope so.” his expression is grim, cold hard sea ice against their sailing ship, and she is unsure as to whether they will navigate this storm safely but she pretends for him,

“It will.” she winds her arms around him and smiles to find him hugging back, loose but warm,

“Thank you, Jester.”

“It’s alright. Love you.”

“I know.”

He gives her hair one last smooth stroke before she smiles and disappears into her room, alone, and Fjord returns to his own.

 

 

He has barely closed the door when the rage of the tempest begins,

 _You must leave now, my Vessel,_ it whispers to him with a bitten hint of anger, and Fjord- he can play at that game, too.

“Nah,” he snaps back, “I’m goin’ to sleep. An’ tomorrow, I’m gettin’ some answers.”

_You will leave tonight._

“No.” He comes to the bed and then, suddenly, there’s a terrible burst of pain in his head, his hands come and clutch at skin and the short-cropped sides of his hair, dull claw-tips catching and pulling and aching as the pain inside his skull slowly subsides.

 _Tonight._ The voice in his mind demands and Fjord loses the will to argue.

“Fine.” He says, bitterness in his voice, he turns for the door, “But I gotta say goodbye t’ Jester.”

 _No,_ hisses his voice, _now._

“Look, either I say goodbye t’ Jes, or you fight me the whole _fuckin’_ way. Alright?”

There’s a quiet pause. Fjord- he doesn’t expect the thing in his head to give in, that would be too easy, but it has always been open to compromise before. It cannot take Jester from him.

He does not expect it to buffet him out of his own consciousness, but he was not joking about the fight.

He sees his vision blur and fade into the distance as his body moves around him, he can feel it, but he is no longer in control. It feels as though he is locked inside his own head, the rush of the tempest filling, pulsing across his nerves and Fjord _fights._ He swims with the fierceness of a drowning man, pushing back toward himself and he hears his own voice ricochet around him,

 _For Jester,_ and his mouth moves, makes the shape but not the sound and his head is empty and rings like an echo chamber. He thinks of her, of everything that she is to him, of everything she has done. He thinks of the way she is, the sensation of sea-damp sand underfoot and the salt breeze of the ocean clinging to driftwood, preserving every inch. He thinks of her happiness, of her laughter,

“For Jester!” and he hears himself speak, this time, his body trembling in the battle for dominance.

Whatever it is calling his body home, holding him hostage with a knife to his own throat in the grip of his own hand, it is far stronger than Fjord had ever expected. It scares him, terrifies him, but he keeps fighting. He will say goodbye to Jester.

 

It feels like this may be the last opportunity he gets to do so.

 

Fjord claws his way, fighting tooth and talon to get back to his own body, Jester’s name, Jester’s voice, Jester’s laugh- it all drives him to fight and he feels sick, woozy, horrible but he looks down at his hands as he flexes his fingers and knows that he controls his own body, for now. He slams his walls up as he moves from his room, there is no way he can keep this tempest beast at bay for long.

He knocks at her door and she is half dressed when she answers and when his name is silenced on her lips this time, it is because he is kissing her with all the force and love that he can muster, all of the things that keep him within his own body, within his own outline and she trembles beneath him, unaware and terrified.

“Fjord?” as he pulls his lips from hers, he feels sweat beading on his forehead, feels the beast within him clawing at his walls, tearing them down, brick by brick. He does not think that he will come back.

This is his last chance.

“I love you, Jester.” He tells her in the pale slits of moonlight illuminating her from behind and casting a milky glow across her skin. Her eyes widen, and he does not turn to see whatever emotions follow on her face- he flees, with all of his remaining strength, control, he hears her _scream_ his name as he scrambles out of the chateau and into the night air, he hears the doors behind him slam open and Jester’s terror on the wind and then he hears nothing. His walls collapse around him, and he feels as though he is been torn in a thousand directions at once, every atom of his being exploding and screaming in burning agony.

 

And then Fjord is no more.

 

 

 

There’s the raucous pounding of feet following Jester’s scream.

 

None of them have ever heard such distress in her voice and they are all out of bed in moments, even Molly and Caleb, who had been quite soundly asleep entwined moments prior.

They tear down the stairs just behind Beau, Nott and Yasha at their own heels, and they find Jester at the front entrance, her nightdress untied and loose around her shoulders, she has collapsed to her knees on the cold stone steps with her face in her hands and no trace of Fjord to be seen. His door, when they had passed it, had been wide open.  
Beau gets to her first, crouches at one side and then Molly is at the other pulling her into a hug without words, they do not understand what has gone so wrong but Jester is crying so hard she can barely breathe.

“Fjord,” Jester chokes as she curls into Molly and Beau plasters across her other side, “ _Fjord._ ”

“What’s happened?” Nott is the next to reach them, darting ahead of Caleb and moving to the front, “Where’s Fjord?”

Jester shakes her head and burrows further into Molly’s shirt, they rub gentle circles into her back.  
Caleb kneels beside Molly, an ache in his heart that he doesn’t know quite how to fix. He curls into Molly’s side and sets a hand to Jester’s arm, Yasha ducks and puts a hand on her shoulder, soft violet radiating from her palm in waves and Jester relaxes with each ripple across her skin, until she’s slumped against Molly dry-sobbing.

“What happened?” It’s Clay to ask again, towering over the lot of them with concern written into his eyes.

“Fjord’s gone.” Jester tells him hollowly, “I don’t think he’s coming back this time.”

“What makes you say that? He’s always come home before.”

Jester takes a breath that stutters and shakes, pressing as close to Molly as she can, physically impossible as she matches the curve of her body to the shape of theirs.  
And then she sits back and they clear a ring half around her, watching as her fists clench and unclench, rinse and repeat,

“He’s always come home before.” Molly repeats Clay’s words gently, a hand set to Jester’s leg. She’s freezing in the cold night air and thin nightdress.

Marion stands beside Clay with her sad eyes on her daughter and Jester does not look at her.

“He told me that he loves me. He said _I love you._ He’s not coming back.”

There is a shocked silence across them. Those that know Fjord know that she is right. This is a finality in his words.  
  
Between them, Beau and Yasha haul Jester to her feet. Caleb and Nott close the doors behind them as they carry her up the stairs, hanging limp between them like a string of broken christmas lights, all of the joy and brightness from her eyes and body is gone. She is as a puppet with cut strings, and Molly drags her, Beau, and the rest of their friends into Jester’s room.  
It is an unspoken agreement that they will not leave. They all climb onto the one bed, it creaks below them and it’s cramped but Jester lays between Beau and Molly, laid on Beau’s chest like she once would have laid on Fjord. Behind Beau, Yasha keeps an arm over both of her girls, and Caleb finds himself half-pinned under Molly as they try to curl over both him and Jester at once, Clay’s head in his lap and Nott curled at the end of the bed like a cat.

The group fits together like a puzzle, and Jester does not cry, but she does choke half-sobs until she falls to sleep.

Molly nuzzles up to Caleb’s neck as Jester’s breathing evens out.

“Are you alright?” They whisper, and Caleb gives half of a strained smile and kisses their forehead,

“Ja, _Liebling,_ I am fine. I- hm. I’m not _happy,_ but-” he makes a few noises as he tries to think of the right words, and Molly hushes him, rubbing his side as best they can from this position.

“It’s alright, darling, I understand. Go to sleep, now.”

“Thank you.” Caleb cuddles around them as best he can, “You, too.”

Molly hums gently, rubs their cheek gently to his shoulder before stilling to sleep. As Caleb follows their example, he finds himself somehow grateful at this new little family that he has found.

He misses his parents.

One day, he hopes to introduce Molly to them.

One day.

 

 

That’s all he dreams about that night.

 

 

When the group wakes the next morning, it is to Marion rapping gently at Jester’s door.

Over the course of the night, it seems, they have turned into something of a Jester pile-up, layered around and over her. As they come to, Marion lets herself into Jester’s room quietly, waiting as the group stretches and yawns,

“Jester? Can I talk to you?”

“Is it about- the pot?”

She goes to say Fjord’s name and it stings in her throat like seawater on wounds. Marion nods, and _oh boy,_ Jester does _not_ like that grave expression on her face.

“What is it?”

“I’ve spoken with a couple of friends and... well, I was right. About what it is.”

Jester struggles to sit up, the rest of her friends just as intrigued now,

“But _what is it?_ ”

Marion scoots closer to the bed,

“Make room,” she addresses mostly Nott and Clay, “This comes with a story.”

They shuffle into a tight ring on the bed, forcing Molly into Caleb’s lap, sideways for comfort and his arms around their waist. Jester leans into Beau, and finds an arm around her shoulders in silent comfort.

 _It’s alright,_ Beau’s quick, darting gaze says when their eyes meet, and Jester half believes her.

“Are you familiar with the Circle of Fortune?” Marion looks around the circle and, for the most part, she is met with nods. Only Clay and Molly look somewhat uncertain.

“I know _of_ it,” Molly shifts on Caleb’s lap, “But I’m not _familiar._ ”

Marion nods; it is a legend often reserved for the higher years, anyway, regarded as too terrifying for younger children.

“The easiest version of it is… something like this. Originally, when Gaia locked Caertium away in Shyklvathys, they sealed the locks to the prison with twenty-two relics. When Gaia was restored by the Heroes, they created an additional measure of protection in the form of the Circle of Fortune. These people were given intrinsic knowledge of the relics to protect them, and had the ability to communicate with their fellow Circle members through their dreams.”

Molly leans closer to Caleb,

“ _Shyklvathys?_ ” they whisper, barely a breath, and feel Caleb’s lips brush their ear as he turns to whisper back,

“ _A prison, deep underwater, where the God of Destruction is held._ ”

Molly gives him a squish of thanks, Marion continues,

“Shortly after the resurrection of Gaia, Caertium’s bonds began to weaken. He was able to affect the minds of those on the surface, able to control and implore them, and sent them to break the relics that kept the bars to his prison secure. And he almost succeeded- the Circle of Fortune managed only to keep one relic safe from harm, out of the original twenty-two, but with such a precarious force keeping Caertium sealed away, they needed to re-create the seals.”

“Hold on,” Jester interrupts, “You said, um- Caertium controlled them? Made them break things?”

Marion nods solemnly, and Jester’s eyes widen as the implications hit her.

“Oh.”

“To re-create the seals, each of the Circle members had to make sacrifices. And to finalise the ritual, one of the Circle members had to sacrifice _themself,_ their soul, and everything that they are. Their memory is lost to the bonds that seal Caertium below us, even their partner couldn’t remember them. To prevent it from ever happening again, the Circle, along with the Gods of Life and Death, created _Guardians,_ Lynchpins, a boundary between the relics and their destruction. As long as the Lynchpin associated with a particular relic lived, that relic couldn’t be broken.”

There’s a long sigh, Marion rubs at her eyes with one hand,

“Of course, there’s more to it, but… that’s all that’s really necessary. Do you understand?”

“Fjord is… being possessed by Caertium.” Jester says, and her voice is so dull and hollow that Beau even startles. When she pulls Jester upright, she does not resist, limp and loose and her eyes staring into nothingness.

“I’m worried that Fjord is being coerced into breaking the relics. And to break the relics, the Lynchpins must be dead.”

“Do you think he’s killing people?”

Marion sighs again,

“It’s possible. It’s also possible that Caertium has someone else doing that. But, Jester, and this is very important- you need to keep away from him.”

“ _What?_ ” Jester lights up like a fire, sitting upright, shoulders drawn up, “I can’t leave him! I’ve got to help!”

“Jester…”

“That’s _Fjord,_ mama! My Fjord! I can’t just- I can’t- I _love him._ ” There are tears, and not one of her friends can move to help her as she chokes on her own anguish, “I can’t just leave him.”

“Jester.” Marion leans forward, sets one hand on Jester’s shoulder, tilts her chin up with the other, “My darling Jester. I’m sorry that I never told you. You need to stay away from him, because he will _kill you,_ okay?”

“Fjord would never hurt me.” Jester blubs, and Marion wipes tears from her cheeks, mirroring tears springing in her own eyes,

“He doesn’t have a choice. Once Caertium figures it out- Jester, you and I are Wall Keepers.”

“Yeah? And? I know?”

“We’re _Lynchpins,_ Jester. When Caertium figures it out, he will send minions after us. It may be Fjord. He may use Fjord’s attachment to us to try and slip past our defences. You are in danger, my Jester, I am so sorry.”

 

 

 

Marion dismisses the rest of them soon after as she sits with Jester sobbing against her, Caleb and Molly trail back to the latter’s room to change. Caleb does not expect to sleep anywhere else whilst he’s here, so he’s hauled his own suitcase into Molly’s room for ease.

 

Molly shifts head of him as they enter, ruffling through their skirts as Caleb closes the door,

“I think, today, I will be spending some time with Caduceus,” he tells them as gently as he can, and the effect is- as expected- immediate. Molly stands up and whips around to stare at him with wide, frightened eyes,

“You’re coming back, though? Tonight? You won’t leave-” they catch their own tongue and swallow it down again, “But it’s alright, if you want to.”

“ _Schatz,_ ” Caleb crosses to them and tucks that one loose strand of hair back behind their ear gently, affectionately, “Of course. There is nowhere I’d rather sleep.”

Molly visibly relaxes, and Caleb gives an amused breath of laughter, he leans in and kisses the bridge of their nose before resting his forehead to theirs, his hand at their cheek, their hands find his shoulders and fingers skim the skin of his neck under the curtain of ginger hair.

“I don’t want to force you into sleeping here if you’d rather be alone, or with Clay.” Molly murmurs, and Caleb rubs his thumb across their cheek almost idly,

“I promise,” he tells them solemnly, “This is where I want to be. I just miss Caduceus’ company, I feel that I have been neglecting him since we arrived here. And I am worried about his reaction to this news, just as I am worried about yours.”

Molly tugs gently at Caleb until he wraps his arms around their shoulders, enveloping them in a hug,

“I think, though, that Yasha knows best how to help you at this time.”

“You’re right.” Molly’s voice is muffled by Caleb’s shoulder and hair, their grip is terrifyingly tight, desperate, “Five minutes, before you go?”

“Whatever you need.” Caleb agrees, and Molly tugs him over to their bed until the two of them are collapsing in a pile of cuddles and limbs. Molly does not cry, but they do cling, as tight as they possibly can, and Caleb clings right back.

He does consider telling Molly that he loves them, but crushes that out of himself pretty quickly.  
He’s never been in love before. He doesn’t even know if that’s what this is.  
Instead, he kisses the top of their head and holds them as close to him as he possibly can.

  


When Clay and Caleb escape into the streets of Port Emelle a few hours later, the first place that they go is the odd little loose tea shop that Clay had spotted on their first journey through town.

Clay needs more ingredients for his blends.

Caleb wants to make something for Molly.

 

The store is run by a friendly, dark-skinned elf with bright green eyes and a smile like the sun, only a shade dimmer than Jester’s usual one. They greet the two boys kindly as they slip into the shop, and Caleb smiles but sticks close to Clay’s elbow as they mill around.  
The store offers their own bags, for those that want to bag their own tea, and Caleb jumps at the chance. He chooses his ingredients carefully, chamomile and lavender, oatflower and wheatgrass, he chooses all of the things that Clay tells him make a good relaxing tea.

It costs him a decent amount, in the end, but he tells Clay that Molly is worth it and receives a one-armed hug for his honesty,

“They’d be glad to know you think that way.” Clay advises seriously as Caleb leads them toward a nice café,

“I’m sure they already know,” a half shrug from Caleb, “I sleep with them, I’ve bathed with them, it seems obvious.”

“Molly doesn’t make those kinds of assumptions anymore, they’ve learned not to.”

Caleb hums as he mulls this over, sitting at one of the cute outside tables with the umbrella above to protect them from the sun,

“Maybe I should tell them, then.”

“Yeah, I think that’d be a good idea.” Clay pats at his arm gently, smiling, “Now what do you want to drink?”

 

Clay and Caleb spend a few hours wandering the city, discussing Molly, discussing Beau and Yasha, ignoring the idea of Fjord. And for a few hours, it’s almost easy to pretend nothing is wrong, they both cling to it like a lifeline and Caleb misses Molly. Like a dull burn in his chest, he misses Molly, he’s excited to get back to them when they’re done and even Clay notices the bounce in his step on the way back to the chateau, laughing lightly,

“You’re fond of Molly, then?”

“ _Ja,_ ” Caleb beams at the thought of his dear friend, “I am lucky to have them.”

“Don’t forget to tell them, then.” Clay ruffles Caleb’s hair gently, “They’ll appreciate it. I promise you.”

 

When Caleb returns to Molly’s room, he finds them lying in a tight ball on their bed, restlessly asleep, and he debates on whether or not to wake them.

He decides to try and avoid it, creeping around their room and changing as quietly as he can, stripping his way out of his binder and stiff shirt, he doesn’t intend to leave again today.

He can hear Molly mumbling behind him, and when he turns, it’s in perfect time to find Molly sitting bolt upright, both of their hands going to a spot on their chest where Caleb knows they have a large, gnarled scar, tears in the corners of their eyes. They gasp for breath, looking around the room, and Caleb is moving to them before they can even get his name out of their mouth.  
He collapses onto the bed with Molly already pressing themself against him, sobbing wordlessly and clinging with all of their strength, Caleb makes soft, soothing sounds and speaks in quiet Felis, one arm pressing all of Molly to himself, the other stroking rhythmically across their hair.

“Caleb,” he hears them croak and shushes them, his Molly, who had been so happy just yesterday. He kisses their hair and holds them tight,

“My Molly,” he murmurs, because nothing else fits and they cling ever harder,

“Don’t let go,” they beg between the soft, damp kisses they’re littering over his collarbones, “Don’t ever let go. Don’t leave.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Caleb assures, kissing their forehead and leaving his lips pressed there, “I’m yours.”

“Mine,” Molly whispers, a damp patch against Caleb’s throat, “ _Mine._ Don’t go. Don’t leave.”

“Molly,” Caleb shifts the hand from their hair to tilt their chin up, “Mollymauk, look at me.”

Molly meets his eyes, and Caleb’s heart lurches over the shattered pieces he sees there, the tears and the hurt and he sighs softly,

“I will be here as long as you need me. I am here. I am yours.”

“Mine.” Molly whispers again, calmer this time, they duck back to tuck themself under Caleb’s chin, “Love you.”

It doesn’t register. It should. It doesn’t. It doesn’t strike Caleb as odd, it doesn’t hurt his heart, he hears the words and understands and expects pain but it doesn’t come.

“Go to sleep, _Liebling._ I will hold you until you wake.”

“Mine.” Molly murmurs, and repeats, like a quiet mantra that fades and fades and fades until it’s gone, and they are asleep. Caleb does not follow their lead. He stays awake, Molly in his arms, appreciating each and every second here, every millimetre of their warmth, every piece of Molly.

 

He will build Molly a happy ending, even if he must use his own blood and bone to do so.

He does not question, but knows, inherently, that he has fallen in love.


	10. To live without a lifeline,

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life without Fjord is a drag, man.
> 
> And thus begins the solstice

The remainder of their time at Port Emelle is somewhat dulled by the loss of Fjord. The group splits his things between them to take back, and Jester- oh, she is heartbreaking.

Caleb has never seen her any shade of this kind of dull and forlorn. He had suspected for a while, now, that her jovial, upbeat attitude was mostly a mask to hide the insides she keeps safe from the world, but he never wanted the theory proved in this way.

 

Jester has trouble leaving her room.

 

The others cycle around, go in, sometimes, play games and sit with her, safe, talking, but none of them can forget what they know. That Jester, merely by being alive, is in danger. That Fjord, their friend, her love, could be the one to kill her.  
 Jester still laughs. Of course she does, she’s _Jester,_ there’s nothing in the world that could kill her laugh for long, but it does not have the heart that it once did. It sounds hollow, now, as they leave Port Emelle by ferry and the sea air whips her half-manic laugh along with her hair, drawing it from her lips as she waves to Marion.

Molly tucks their hand into Caleb’s and leans against his shoulder.

 

The journey back to Solazone is morose and aching, they make it in one night and get back past three in the morning. Caleb’s fingers stay laced with Molly’s until they stand between the doors to their rooms, their friends bidding one another goodbyes of exhaustion, tired, sullen eyes staring through space entirely.  
Caleb pulls Molly to the side, uses his free hand to sweep their bangs back from their face and cup their cheek gently, pulling them in toward him, he rests his forehead to theirs.

He does not speak. They do not speak. They’re quiet in the shadows, there is nothing that can be said.

Seconds trail past, breath heavy clouds in the air, and then Caleb sighs and draws back, presses one last, gentle kiss to their forehead, lips chapped and dry.

“Goodnight.” He says softly, and Molly squeezes his fingers wordlessly before they part into their respective rooms, flinging one last, sad look over their shoulders to one another.

 

He misses them immediately. He misses their touch on his skin, he misses going to sleep with them, and when he wakes the next morning, he feels horribly, indescribably lonely.

He doesn’t _want_ to go straight to them. It’s not healthy.

But the fact remains that Fjord isn’t there, Beau is sleeping with Yasha, and Caleb is in love with Molly.

So, naturally, the first thing he does when he wakes up is get out of bed and trail through to their room.

 

Molly has not slept at all, they lie awake, in Fjord’s bed, staring at the ceiling and begging themself to cry. To move. To feel anything.

They barely notice when the dawn comes and Caleb creeps in beside them, curls against them on Fjord’s bed and kisses their throat, murmuring words that sound like a dull buzz in the back of their mind. They wrap one arm around Caleb’s shoulders as he settles his head on their chest to hear their slow heartbeat. They are dimly aware that Caleb does not go to sleep; rather, he joins their odd little vigil of staying perfectly, absently awake and letting the mind wander off and rest by itself. Somehow, it is quiet.

It doesn’t feel good.

But it feels better with Caleb here.

 

Molly passes out in class.

 

It makes sense, really, they haven’t slept, not even on the train, though they’d been so tempted. There’s a soft _thunk_ from behind Caleb and he doesn’t need to turn to know the noise of Molly’s skull hitting something solid.

He skips his next class to take them back to the dorms, Jester comes with them, she carries Molly when Caleb can’t- most of the time- and the three of them crawl together into Caleb and Jester’s beds, pressing the two against one another, just so there’s more space.

Molly collapses in the middle, Jester to one side, Caleb to the other.

 

Their family is broken, and they just don’t know how to fix it.

 

Caleb curls, cuddles up to them, and it’s- odd. Because if one of the two was going to cuddle them, and the other was just going to lie close, they would have expected Jester to be the cuddly one.

But it isn’t Jester that presses against their side and kisses their horn, it’s Caleb. And Jester just curls with her back to them, close enough that she can feel them breathe and move, but not touching, and that concerns them. It worries them.

Caleb’s fingers trace the line of their jaw, and they turn their head to meet his eyes.  
He is smiling, small and sad, but smiling as he shifts forward to kiss the tip of their nose,

“Molly,” he says, instead of all the things he wishes that he could say. It seems to work just the same, though, they smile just a little bit as they tilt and rest their forehead to his, exhaustion tugging at their bones and pulling them down.

“My Caleb.”

Jester elbows them gently in the ribs in a silent bid for them to sleep, and they chuckle as they twine their tail around hers, affectionate, gentle, exhausted.  
And then they sleep.

 

There’s an odd new normal that settles slowly over the spires of Solazone over the next week, two weeks, a month, as Fjord does not return.

“He’ll come home eventually,” becomes the new mantra of the group, “He always comes home.”

 

“He’ll come home,” Jester tells Beau defiantly, three weeks in with tears streaking mascara down her face. And by this time, really, Beau is starting to lose hope (he’s never been _gone_ this long) but she’s learned nothing from Fjord if not how to pretend,

“Yeah,” she says with false determination, “He’ll come back.”

Jester cuddles into her, and she can’t argue.

 

When they stay in their own dorm rooms, Jester sleeps with Beau, Caleb sleeps restlessly. He did not mean to become so reliant on Molly’s presence for his own peace of mind, but with Fjord gone, the knowledge that it could happen to any of them is heavy. It weighs him down in the wrong ways, he sinks into his bed feeling leaden.

 

So they don’t stay in their own dorm rooms anymore.

 

Caleb and Beau take to Molly and Yasha’s shared bed, a squish-squeeze of all four of them but they make it work. Caleb falls asleep with Molly’s breath in soft puffs against his collarbones, wakes up more often than not with his back to Molly’s, their tail twined around his wrist or ankle or thigh.

 

 

Beau catches Caleb and Molly up at the tower one evening, a few days before the summer solstice.

Preparations are already well underway down in the grounds, the market and the bonfire being set together carefully, below, they can see the swathes of coloured cloth and the construction of the sundial from the top of the tower and then Beau scares the shit out of them by stomping up the stairs.

“Hey,”

“ _Fuck,_ ” Molly jumps almost straight off of the tower in their shock, stopped only by Caleb pulling them by the collar of their shirt in toward him, the two of them tumble onto the stone instead.

“Not a smart place to sit,” Beau gestures to the space on the wall that Molly has just vacated, raising her eyebrows at the two on the floor with a crook of a smirk, “Coulda splatted yourself.”

“I can fly!” Molly protests as they roll off of a squished-looking Caleb. Beau gives a snort, and sits herself on the stone beside the two as they pull themselves to sitting, hands already sneaking toward one another and twining fingers in the middle.

 _Gross,_ Beau really does wonder how long it’ll take them to figure out they’re in love with each other.

“What’s up?” Molly asks, nudging her with their knee as she falls quiet, and Beau just sort of silently pulls a smallish velvet bag from a catch on her belt

“Whassat?”

“Uh,” and it’s the first time that Caleb has ever seen Beau look genuinely nervous, she gently pulls the cord of the bag loose and carefully tips the contents into her lap.

“They’re not the neatest,” she sounds dubious herself as she runs her own fingers over metal, “I’m trying, this isn’t- I don’t do this a lot, alright?”

Molly shuffles in to get a better look, and Beau holds them out for her friends to see.  
They’re some kind of fine silver, swirls in wide spirals that would fit around Molly’s thigh, with a thin wire of black running down the very centre of the outside, all the way around. The metal isn’t entirely polished, there are dents and it looks… somewhat clumsy, but it’s heartfelt. Molly can see this, can see Beau’s worry, they smile at her in reassurance,

“What are they?” Caleb asks, intrigue in his eyes,

“They’re, uh. Armlets. And, look- look-”

She takes one of her own-coloured crystals from a smaller pouch at her waist and presses it into a divot at one end of the spiral. Immediately, the thin black wire wound along the length of the armlet lights up, glowing in Beau’s own cobalt blue, bathing all three of them in a faint cold light.

“Wow,” says Molly, wide-eyed,

“Yasha will love them.” Caleb says, half unthinking, “She will be proud to wear your colour.”

“Yeah, well, uh… you know, she only has Molly’s right now. An’ I think- I mean- I’d kill for her.”

Molly quirks a smile, and maybe they try to make it smug, but it doesn’t work that way. It comes out soft, warm,

“She’d kill for you too.” They assure her, and Beau stumbles over being a person for a few moments before she chokes a cough to clear her head,

“Yeah, well. I was thinkin’ of givin’ ‘em to her on the summer solstice. Y’know, make it special.”

“That’s perfect! Sweet, very sweet, yes,” Molly exclaims, and finds Beau’s squint turned in their direction; that was too enthusiastic, even for them.

“What?”

“It’s nice,” this comes genuinely, “I’m glad you’re finally doing this.”

There is a pause. A long, soft pause as Beau tries, and fails, repeatedly, to talk. She swallows a few times, eyes shifting between Molly and Caleb.

“I-” she tries, and her voice cuts out, “I just- Molly-”

Molly is patient, smiling, _gentle,_ they nod.

“I love her.”

This is followed by a long, high-pitched noise that sounds incredibly similar to air escaping the pinched neck of a balloon.

Caleb laughs, sudden and loud, and Molly is torn between grinning at Beau or Caleb. They choose Beau, instead pulling Caleb in toward them and smothering the sunlight of their smile with Caleb’s hair, they press their face to his head and kiss and Beau pulls a face,

“Gross.”

“Yeah, sure,” Molly replies, eyes glimmering, muffled by Caleb’s head, “Like you haven’t just admitted you have feelings.”

Caleb’s arms find their way around Molly’s waist, he cuddles into them, settling his head on their shoulder,

“I am happy for you, Beauregard. Genuinely. You deserve this bravery.”

“Huh. Thanks, Caleb.”

Beau scoops her armlet gift back into the little pouch and stands, Molly waves one hand as she does,

“Try asking Jester for advice on smoothing the metal out,” they offer, “She makes a lot of weapons and stuff, she might have some tips.”

“That’s not a terrible idea, actually. Thanks, asshole.”

“Fuck you.” Molly’s eyes belie their pride, and Beau gives a small, genuine smile as she turns,

“Fuck you too. See y’ later.”

“Later.” Molly agrees, and watches Beau disappear down the spiral staircase before they shift to kiss Caleb’s hair again and find him sitting a little straighter,

“That was… unexpected.” Caleb comments, and Molly gives a soft, light laugh, pulls one hand under Caleb’s curtain of sun-warmed hair, brushing their thumb against his neck because they know he likes it,

“It’s about time that she got around to it. I’m proud of her.”

“ _Ja,_ as am I.” Caleb meets Molly’s eyes, briefly, flickers a quick smile and lets it die down to pleasantly contented as he relaxes into the repetitive pattern against his throat.

He would do anything for Molly’s hands on his neck, really, even if it meant having the air choked from his lungs.

He also knows that Molly would never do that unless he asked, which is pretty nice, too.

He is rewarded for his happiness, he feels Molly lean in to him and nudge their head under the hair on the other side of his neck, feels their breath a split second before the soft touch of their slightly chapped lips as they press to his skin. Almost unconsciously, Caleb tilts his head to give Molly more space, and Molly draws a line of kisses so soft they’re barely a touch at all. From Caleb’s collarbone, exposed to the summer sun, all the way to the angle of his jaw and it feels-

Intimate.

It feels wonderful, like something lovers might do and Caleb allows himself to believe, for a few wonderful moments, that it could be.  
He shakes that out of himself quick enough, but it’s long enough for his grip to tighten on Molly’s hip enough to bruise.  
Long enough for Molly to notice, to chuckle warmly directly into Caleb’s ear.

“Caleb, sweetheart, you know there’s better ways to mark me than that.”

“I- _sheiße,_ Molly, I’m sorry.” he pulls back, and Molly catches the offending hand to pull to their lips, kissing the backs of his fingers,

“I think it’s sweet, love, don’t worry. But really, there’s always… colours, you know.”

Caleb blinks dumbly for a moment, and then winces away,

“You do not want to wear my colour.” He says with hurt in his voice, pulling his hand from Molly’s grip and cupping it against his own chest, like something will come to take Molly’s kiss from his skin.

“Oh, trust me. I do.” Molly reaches out, gentle, tucks Caleb’s hair behind his ear and frowns when he flinches away, “Why wouldn’t I want to?”

“Molly-” Caleb stops himself and takes a deep, shuddering breath, “How- how much do you know? About magic colour?”

“Uh… it… is?” Molly cocks their head, confused, and Caleb closes his eyes to shake his head, pain evident in the lines of his face,

“The colour of your magic is the colour of your soul, Mollymauk. It is a representative of who you are as a person, everything that you embody, and it- it does not usually, change. It is locked in, from moment of birth, in accordance with fate. But- but sometimes, if something- something happens,” he chooses his words carefully, very carefully, “It can change you. It can change your fate, and your colour resettles as a result of such an experience. Brighter colours, brighter people. Jester’s is magenta, likely from her loving personality and connection to Saake. Beau’s is bright blue for the force of her soul and her calm exterior. Yours is gold, because you have a heart of such. And mine- mine is almost black, Mollymauk.”

Molly blinks, slow, as this all trickles in and they try and put the pieces together. It doesn’t work very well.

“I don’t understand.”

“People do not like my colour, Molly, because the darkness is a symbol of what is inside me. Evil, and murder, and- and selfishness, cowardice- Mollymauk, I am a _garbage person,_ I- you cannot wear- my colour, Molly, it is a mark of _shame._ ”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Molly takes Caleb’s face in their hands, “My dear Caleb. It’s a mark of _you,_ and it’s _you_ that I care about, not the burdens you hold. You’re mine, my Caleb, and I want the world to know that. Here-”

They take their hands from his face to go to their own neck, unclipping one of the many necklaces. This one is shaped as a peacock feather in silver, they tap the crystal from the slot- empty, previously Cree’s colour- and close their hand around it in a shimmer of gold. They re-fit the crystal, and the “eye” of the feather, as well as a thin line around the centre piece, they both light up in their own golden colour and gently, sweetly, Molly reaches to Caleb and clips the necklace into place around his neck, laying the feather to his chest with a gentle touch, they press their fingertips to a spot over his heart,

“My Caleb,” they repeat, their free hand finds Caleb’s chin and holds him to meet their eyes, “Everyone will know that you’re mine.”

Caleb chokes tears as he collapses into Molly’s waiting arms, curling and cuddling up to them desperately,

“ _Ich liebe dich,_ ” he sobs against their shoulder, “ _Ich liebe dich,_ Mollymauk, _dankeschӧn,_ Molly-”

“Darling,” Molly murmurs, kissing the top of Caleb’s head, “I just- I want people to know, you know. I’ll kill for you, Caleb Widogast. I would live and die for you.”

“You- you know that I would do the same, _ja?_ I just- I do not want to sully you with…”

There’s a soft shadow of deep, dark blue around Caleb’s fingertips as he summons fire to his palm at arm’s length from Molly.

“I won’t try and force you into anything, love, if you’re happier this way, that’s fine. But I’d be honoured to wear your colour, I’d be honoured to know that someone could look at me and know I’m as much yours as you are mine.”

Caleb almost kisses them. Almost, so close, he comes a hair’s breadth from the impulse but pulls it back at the last moment to shift and kiss their forehead instead, resting his face there with his breath unsteady. Molly runs their hands down his sides.

“Hey,” they say, and their voice is gentle, now, “I got a nice bath bomb from town the other day. You wanna come take a bath with me?”

“I- I- _ja,_ I would- I want to do that.”

“Wonderful. Come on, love,” and there’s a swirl of wind as Molly’s magic pulls the air around them and lifts them both from the stone of the tower, Caleb clings to their shoulders as the two of them float silently back to the dorms.

 

 

Molly bans the others from the bathroom when they get back, Caleb prepares the bath, and they both slip into the glittering blue-purple water. The bathtubs here are far bigger than at the Lavish Chateau, there’s room enough for both of them and then some, but Caleb wastes little time before he’s at Molly’s side and curling against them. The water is silk-soft, but nothing compared to their skin and their warmth against him, there’s a faint glimmer of light through Caleb’s closed eyes and he opens them to see Molly’s wings pressed against the side of the tub.

He looks up at them, quizzical, and they shrug a little, best they can with his head on their shoulder,

“You make me happy.”

Caleb smiles, curls further around them and feels their tail slip to wind around his thigh, their damp fingers card through his hair and he falls asleep, there, next to them and they kiss his hair.

This is good.

This is nice.

Caleb’s scars are more evident underwater, when Molly’s fingers run across them. All of the little lines that litter his arms, all of the burns, they feel more prominent somehow.  
Molly loves them all. They love every inch of Caleb, from the thin fuzz of chest hair he’s beginning to grow to his wonderful blue eyes, even the temptation of his perfect lips. They can’t have that, sure, but they can have this; Caleb is pulled flush to their side and glittering in the water, the steam rises in slow coils around the two of them and Molly is happy.

They want this with Caleb forever.

They’re not sure when they fall asleep, but by the time Frumpkin headbutts them awake, the water is barely warm.

“Caleb,” they murmur, shaking him, “We fell asleep.”

Caleb gives a soft whine and clings closer, the ghost of a kiss against Molly’s neck. They chuckle warmly and shift a hand to squish at his hip, getting a far smaller handful of bone than they had last time. Good.

“We’ll be prunes, love, come on.”

 

Caleb’s hands fit so perfectly to the shape of Molly’s as they crawl into their bed with damp hair and laced fingers, Molly’s wings still bright on their shoulders, Caleb’s necklace still bright with their gold.

“ _Mein,_ ” he murmurs to them as they tuck under his chin, and he feels them smile,

“ _Ja,_ ” they reply, cuddling closer. Caleb holds them tight and hopes dearly, selfishly, that he never has to let go.

 

“Ready for the solstice?” Jester asks Beau with a bright grin on her face, rocking on the balls of her feet at the door to the dorm. Beau rolls her eyes affectionately, smiling,  
  
“Suppose. Still, I don’t like the whole _not sleepin’_ thing, I like my rest.”

“Aww, you can sleep after the sun rises.” Jester bounces over to kiss the top of Beau’s head, “And your thing? For Yasha?”

“Yeah, they’re done.” Beau pats the little velvet pouch, “Thanks for your help, Jes.”

“Aww, any time. She’ll love them.”

“Yeah, I hope so.” Beau rolls her shoulders a little, takes a deep breath, “Anyway. Wanna come do some training with me, work off the nerves, get an early night? So we’re fresh in th’ mornin’?”

“Ooh, yeah!” Jester claps, “I can test out my modifications to the lollipop!”

“Oh, no, no fuckin’ way, no. You get _one_ type o’ crystal, c’mon, be fair.”

There’s a pause as Jester thinks it over.

“Alright,” she concedes, “But which one? The Mollypop? The Beaun-bon? Or the Claystey?”

“ _Uh,_ maybe go with the Beaun-bon? I mean, I like th’ others but we might as well be usin’ the same type o’ magic, right?”

“Yeah, that seems right. Alright, I’ll go get changed and pull out the lollipop- see you in the Woodgrounds in ten?”

“Sure, see you soon.” Beau waves as she skips out, and stretches when she’s gone, already going for her combat outfit.

She settles the coins of her belt around her hips and mentally tallies each of the colours. Fjord, Jester, Molly, Clay, and latest addition, Nott.  
And stops off at the door opposite them, cracking it open,

“Hey. Molly, Caleb, Jessie and I are gonna do some combat trainin’, wanna come with?”

Caleb looks up from his spot curled beside Molly, watching whatever movie they’ve picked out on their panel.

“Hm. What do you think, Molly?”

“Oh, I’m always up for a little training. If you are?”

“ _Ja,_ I’m getting a little rusty, I think. I spend so much of my free time here,” he pats Molly’s chest as he sits up, “I’m getting fat.”

“You are _not,_ you are still stick thin.” Molly laughs, one hand set to Caleb’s stomach, “We’ll be there, Beau. Where are you meeting?”

“Woodgrounds.” Beau rolls an affectionate smile at them, “Gross.”

“Whatever,” Molly waves at her dismissively, grinning, and Caleb gives a soft laugh as he leans in to nuzzle against Molly’s neck.

Beau waves back, rolling her eyes once more, and leaves.

 

Molly and Caleb meet the girls out by the Woodgrounds not fifteen minutes later, suited up, weaponless. Unlike Jester and Beau, there’s no way for Molly and Caleb to dull their weapons to non-lethal combat, or even to avoid serious injury. The blunt force is easier to fix, in this situation, but that’s just fine. They’ll work with their magic and crystals, instead.

“We can make it a mini tournament!” Jester claps, “If we all battle each other, then the two with the most wins can have a showdown!

“What about draws?” Molly cocks their head and sets a hand to their hip, the one not tangled with Caleb’s, “What happens if three of us have the same amount of wins? Or all four of us?”

“Keep going until there’s only one left! Or, you know, we could just all battle at once. Last man standing.”

Molly looks to Caleb and murmurs something, soft, receives a quick nod in return.

“We’re both fans of the all-in format. Last man, woman, or gift standing.”

There’s a pause as Jester thinks about this, confusion in her eyes.

“Oh!” She exclaims as it clicks, “ _You’re the gift!_ ”

“Ding ding ding!” Molly grins, already working their free hand into their pouch to slot a series of crystals between their fingers, “I’m ready!”

“Excellent.” Jester’s eyes glimmer with mischief, she takes a couple of steps back, “Last one standing! Eliminated when unconscious, or when you tap out.”

Molly leans in, quickly, presses a kiss to Caleb’s cheek before they split from him,

“Good luck, lovely.” Caleb catches as they whip away, Beau and Jester picking defensive positions ahead of him.

“Everybody ready?” Jester calls across them, and is met with determined nods. She nods back at them, “Then let’s go!”

 

To everyone’s surprise, the first person to move is Caleb. He tosses a crystal in faded violet and they watch it arc, wide, before Caleb smirks and sends a jet of fire to meet it just before it hits the floor.

There is an explosion of fog as the crystal activates, and a series of yelps follow this. Molly immediately hops in, a wide glow of gold, sweeping their magic in a wide spiral, pulling the fog into a tube.

This, however, opens them up to a terrible possibility.

“Mollymauk!” Caleb barks in warning, too late, as Jester brings the lollipop- armed as the Beaun-bon- up, meeting their chest with a heavy _oof,_ there is a flare of blue and Molly goes shooting into the air so high that Caleb can no longer make out the details of their coat or the jewellery on their horns.

“ _Shiiit,_ ” Beau appreciates, briefly, before switching her attentions to the two still on the floor. She stamps, hard, and the earth trembles below them.

Caleb manages, just in time, to teleport away, Jester is not so lucky- the earth swirls around her legs and she yells in surprise. Beau has a split second only to be smug before there is a bright flash of flame around her, a pinwheel that becomes a maelstrom, surrounding her in firelight. Caleb, behind her, grits his teeth against the force it takes to maintain.  
Molly can be heard from above as they flip, a bolt of lightning arcs from them down to Jester, battled out only by her quick thinking- she magnetises the head of the lollipop to her bracer and raises it above her head like a shield. It still hurts, sure, but not nearly as badly as it would.

Caleb and Molly seem to work in unspoken synchronisation, as Molly sails to the floor light-footed and Caleb’s flame forces Beau to step aside, gritting her teeth to think of an escape plan.

“Clear it!” Jester yells at her, “If you can clear it, I can clear a path!”

“You’re the one with the crystals!” Beau barks back as she and Jester are both entwined with wreathes of flame around them, “Use the Mollypop!”

“Right!”

Jester slips her clip aside, changing the crystals, and the head of the lollipop swirls in gold as she re-attaches it to the handle, “Beau, duck!”

Beau hits the floor, and Jester spins, the Mollypop glowing gold enough to rival the flames and trailing a tornado behind it, pulling the flame aside and out and they see Molly and Caleb, hand-to-hand.

They are evenly matched, in this field. Caleb swings low, forces Molly to hop back and trip over Frumpkin, they spin before they can hit the ground and there is a crackle of electricity around their fist as they aim for an uppercut.

Jester grins, bright, and her eyes flare in bright pink as she takes control of Caleb’s mind and forces his hand to the crystals at his hip, Molly’s electricity flourishes through him and Jester pulls back before Caleb’s pain leaks over to her, he goes flying, and every single one of the crystals he had been touching activates.

There is a burst of ice and fire, light, plants explode from his hip as he tumbles backward. He lands in a rapidly growing thicket of brambles, and Molly’s cry of alarm doesn’t have time to leave their lips before they’re hitting the floor, outlined in pale blue.

“ _Submit!_ ” they croak, and Beau knows it must be serious if they’ve fought through the gravity to say so, she releases quickly and turns to Jester, eyebrows raised. Jester is wincing, a little, her unintentional consequences seem pretty serious.

“Truce.” Jester spits to Beau quickly, “Come back to it in a minute.”

Beau nods and holsters her staff over her shoulder, rushing over toward Caleb.

Molly gets there first, tearing at the brambles with their bare hands, scattering their blood across the grass as they root for their friend in the thorns. They’re not calling Caleb’s name, but they are panting, slipping on the frost-covered soot of the grass where the crystals have mixed.

“Watch out.” Beau tells Molly, crouching beside the brambles.

 

Plants.

 

Fuck.

 

She hates plants, _so_ much, she has never been good at this aspect of her Earth magic, but she has watched Caduceus. She can try. Caleb is in there.

She focuses, hard, a deep breath to centre herself as Jester pulls Molly back and tries to heal their hands, they will not let her. They’re coughing out Caleb’s name, and Beau blocks out the sound, silences the world around her.

“Come on,” she murmurs to herself, her heartbeat loud in her ears, the thorns ahead of her glowing blue, “Come _on._ ”

Slowly, slowly, the brambles part and shift away, revealing a groaning, ruffled Caleb in the centre. Beau sweats from the exertion, Molly tears away from Jester and tramples the flattened brambles to reach Caleb, scooping him up from the thorns and carrying him away.  
Beau collapses back, gasping for air, flumping onto the grass, and Jester follows Molly as they lay Caleb in the soft green a few strides from their other friends.

“I’m _fine,_ ” Caleb insists as Molly half-sobs over him, their torn hands running over Caleb’s torn clothes, “Just scratched.”

“I got it,” Jester ducks to set a hand to Caleb’s head, healing pink flourishing across his skin and glowing in all of the little wounds. They close, slowly, and Molly ducks to kiss Caleb’s forehead, between Jester’s hands.

“You are a fool,” Caleb tells them affectionately, Jester sits back on her heels and Caleb sits up to pull Molly in toward him, “I’m alright.”

Molly sobs wordlessly against him, flinching away when Jester tries to take their hand to heal.

“I’ll get it.” Caleb assures over his shoulder to her, and turns back to kiss Molly’s cheek again and again, murmuring placations, and slowly, Molly’s hands move to Caleb’s. He heals them, slowly, carefully, closing the tears in their flesh with his shadow-black magic, his forehead to theirs the whole time.

Jester moves to Beau.

“Still wanna fight?”

“Abso-fuckin’-lutely not.” Beau, sprawled on her back, replies, “I’m gonna sleep for a week.”

“You did it though!” Jester crouches, “You did the plants!”

“I’m taking Molly back,” Caleb tells them loudly, “I will see you later.”

“See y’ later, Caleb.”

“Thank you, Beauregard.”  
  
“Any time, yeah.”

Caleb heaves Molly up, one arm around their waist, the other hand between them and lacing their fingers. He murmurs to them softly as they move, leaving the girls behind in affectionate silence.

 

Molly and Caleb take Caleb’s whole dorm room to themselves that night, rinsing the blood from their skin in the bathroom first. Caleb takes Molly’s hands in his own, rubs Molly’s lavender scented soap into their palms gently, stripping away the obscuring layer to observe his work. Molly winces as Caleb presses something that he hasn’t quite healed, lifts the hand from the water with a thin sheen of blood from the newly opened tear.

“I did not get all of them.” Caleb frowns a little, and Molly lifts their other wet hand to his cheek,

“You did enough.”

Caleb pulls Molly’s hurt hand up and presses a gentle kiss over the wound, a shadow-shimmer washes from him and the pain disappears as suddenly as it had come. When Caleb straightens, the cut is gone.

“That was unnecessary.” Molly says, smiling, they draw Caleb toward them and for one brief, head-spinning moment, Caleb thinks they might kiss him. The world is bright around the two of them, Molly's eyes are on his, and Caleb-

“It seems that we find ourselves washing away blood together far too often for my liking.” He breaks the moment. Molly settles their chin on his shoulder instead.

Caleb pulls his damp hands up and presses them to the skin of their back, smiles at the little shudder they respond with.

 

It is Molly to pull them both to bed that night, it is Molly to bundle Caleb against them,

“I worry when you get hurt.” They tell him softly, twining his hair around their fingertips, “It scares me. I don’t want you to go.”

“I have survived worse than brambles, _prihai._ I will be fine.”

“Doesn’t stop me worrying.” Molly gently kisses the top of Caleb’s head, cuddles him closer, “I know Nott does the same.”

“Stop being a sap, Mollymauk.” Caleb’s smile is audible in his voice, he closes his eyes to the lullaby rhythm of Molly’s heartbeat in his ear, their hands warm on his skin. Molly chuckles softly, the sound reverberates through their chest into Caleb, and he finds himself content.

“Speak for yourself, love.” Molly manages, sleepy, and that’s about where Caleb stops registering the world around him as he slips away to sleep against his Mollymauk.

Molly takes a little longer, fighting their exhaustion to observe Caleb, their fingers in his hair, his head on their chest, they let themself hope, perhaps even believe, that Caleb could one day love them, too.

 

 

Caleb is braver in his dreams.

 

He recognises, now, immediately, when he wakes into dreamland and Molly is there, too.  
It is spring on the towertop and there is music below, Molly leans against the wall with their dress whipping around their legs and their hair pulled back by the warm wind up here. The world around them is gaudy, beautiful and bright, but it could never hold a candle to Molly.  
Caleb comes up beside them, mirrors their position and catches the tips of their fingers with his own.

“Hi.” He hears himself say and smiles, bright, Molly’s eyes are brighter as they turn to him.

“Decided to join me?” There is a smirk on their face and Caleb is dreaming. He does not need any of the restraint he has in life. He does not need to stop himself.

“Molly?” His free hand finds their hip and they both stand straight, face-to-face,

“What’s wrong, love?”

He is still nervous.  
Even with nothing to lose, even in his mind, he is nervous and he doesn’t think that will ever go away, but Molly is worth every rabbit-quick heartbeat.

“Can I kiss you?”

He must ask. He would never assume. He will never-  
He probably would, if he’s honest with himself, that is a mistake he would make but here, now, he controls that he is perfect, he is good, he is-

“Please, _Gods,_ yes.”

Molly interrupts his tirade and Caleb smiles as he ducks in closer to them, pausing an instant from their lips and letting them press that last little hair’s breadth away.

Their lips are warm and dry against his own, Caleb’s whole body, soul, heart sings a harmony at their touch. One of their hands finds his jaw, and when they pull apart, Caleb _almost_ lets three precious words drop from his lips but he won’t.

When he first says that, if he ever does, it will be aloud, to the real Molly.

Instead, he says,

“You are precious to me.”

Molly laughs softly, and kisses him again, they sink in the sensation to the stone below, sat in the crook between floor and wall sharing soft kisses. Never intensifying, they stay sweet, gentle, perfect, all Caleb’s heart could ever want from them.

“ _Prihai,_ ” Molly breathes in one instant they are apart, “What does that mean? You’ve called me that twice, now.”

“ _Darling,_ ” Caleb whispers with all the feeling he can, “My darling. _Prihai._ ”

Molly giggles, winds closer to him and Caleb holds them.

“I wish that this was not a dream.” Caleb observes, dully, drawing patterns against their shoulder, “I want this with you in life, too.”

Molly gives a soft snort, gentle,

“It’s by saying it that I know it’s a dream, Caleb, love.” Molly tilts their head up to capture Caleb’s lips once more, he can feel their smile against him.

“At least there are dreams, if the real world will not bend to my will.” Caleb murmurs, soft, to kiss them again.

 

 

Molly wakes up to the alarm the next morning with their heart in their throat and Caleb groaning against their chest, pressing his face into their shirt as he tries desperately to fall back to sleep.

Molly-

Molly has never dreamt of kissing Caleb before.

They have never dared, really, never been able to know their own dreams and yet-

Yet Caleb had _told_ them.

_Prihai._

The word rattles in Molly’s mind, they cannot remember ever hearing it before Caleb but they must have. How else would they know its meaning?

“Come on, _prihai,_ ” they say, unthinking, “Time to get up. Summer solstice.”

Caleb lifts his head, squinting in the grey dawn light,

“What did you call me?”

“I- uh- I said _darling._ ”

A small, sleepy smile appears on Caleb’s face and begins to spread like watercolour,

“ _Nein,_ I don’t think that’s what I heard.”

“Well, it’s- it’s accurate?”

Caleb crawls up them a little, until he’s holding himself above them, beaming,

“ _Prihai,_ ” he says, quietly, and Molly’s smile mirrors his own,  
  
“ _Prihai,_ ” they echo, and Caleb drops to gently rest his forehead to theirs, silent, smiling, he closes his eyes.

They spend a few sweet seconds breathing in contentment, and then Caleb sighs and rolls off of Molly, off of the bed with a pained thud.

“Ow.”

“Are you okay?”

“ _Ja,_ ” he sits up, and there is a silly smile on his face that Molly melts at all over again, “I am fine, just clumsy.”

Molly, deliberately, rolls out of bed to collapse in a heap beside him.

“Looks like I am, too.”

“ _Nein_ , you are just a sappy fool.” Caleb gently brushes their hair from their face, “And that is running us late. Come on, up- up- up- time to get ready for the solstice!”

Molly groans, but does sit, stretching and rolling their shoulders as they move,

“What’re the plans for the day?”

“Well, they’re having the fayre out by Lake Pollux, there’s the Summer Feast from one ‘til seven, and I believe Bryce is holding some kind of party that I promised to drop in on. After ten, we get drunk until sunrise.”

“ _Perfect,_ ” Molly rolls the word like a cat’s purr, shuffling into Caleb’s lap with tired eyes half-lidded, pushing hair behind his ear, “Where’s Frumpkin?”

Caleb pulls a face,

“The foolish thing fell in the lake, so I will have to rebuild him. Should I do it today? It takes a lot of energy.”

Molly thinks about it, tapping at their own chin,

“It’s really your decision, sweetheart. If you want him, do it. If you don’t mind, it can wait.”

“He will be fine for another day or so.” Caleb cuddles them briefly, “I have you to act as a giant cat until then.”

Molly, laughing, butts their head gently to his chin in an imitation of Frumpkin.

Caleb affectionately shoves them off of him,

“Come on, up.”

 It takes them a good chunk of time to dress, Molly floats around Caleb’s room as he changes, distracting him with jokes and tricks and the occasional cat-like headbutt, until Caleb is finally changed and turns to them with an exasperated smile.

“And you are still in my shirt.” He gestures at the long t-shirt they’ve slept in, and Molly gathers a handful to cuddle to themself,

“I have time!” They protest, defensively, and Caleb only chuckles warmly at them. He captures one of their hands and pulls them through to their own room.

 

 

Yasha and Beau are outside by the full dawn, side-by-side in the damp summer light, walking the edge of Lake Pollux and quietly observing the fayre as the finalities are set up around it. Some stallholders are setting out the last of their charms and swathes of their fabric, paying no attention to the two girls wandering by the water’s edge.

 

The dawn turns pink above them.

 

“Doesn’t seem like long since th’ last Summer Solstice.” Beau shakes her head, some kind of disbelieving smile on her face, the velvet pouch heavy at her hip.

“It has been a year,” Yasha’s eyes roam the fayre, skimming over the fairground rides and the food stalls, “It isn’t really that long.”

“Still, last one was… I dunno. Feels special.”

“Yeah, I think that was the day we all really became friends.” Yasha flashes a small smile at Beau and misses the way the latter’s cheeks colour. A bracelet, hip height for Beau, denotes Yasha’s protection under Molly, the little bell charms glow and jingle in their golden colour. It is the only colour that Yasha wears.

So far.  
  
Jester has offered herself, as she does to all of them. Beau wears Jester’s colour in her coin charms, in a ribbon on her staff, in her heart, but Yasha’s-  
Yasha’s colour stains her soul.

“Hey,” she interrupts the morning stillness to tentatively take Yasha’s hand.

Yasha pauses, for a second, still and shocked.

And then she laces their fingers.

Beau stutters in her mind long enough to worry, Yasha squeezes her hand with the softest touch she can muster,

“Are you okay?”

Beau shakes herself like a dog shedding water, shaking off the static feeling around her.

“I’m good,” she lies, “I just- yeah.”

Yasha blinks, slowly. She does not believe her, her Beauregard, she knows her too well to be so foolish. But she lets it slide.

“Did you have something to say?” She asks in a voice that _sounds_ like a smile, “Or did you just want to hold my hand?”

“Can it be both?” Beau returns without missing a beat, ignoring the red flush that raises on her cheeks. Yasha lets out a little chuckle, and Beau feels that knot of worry in her chest slowly unfurl, as it always does when Yasha smiles, laughs, looks at her, really.

“I made you somethin’,” Beau says, before she even realises she’s speaking, and Yasha’s eyes find hers, curious,

“Oh?”

Well. Might as well. She’s already dropped herself in it.  
Beau shifts her free hand to free the pouch from her hip. She’s kept it there for days, now, she lies to herself and swears she does not shake as she holds it out to Yasha.

“You don’t have t’ wear them, I know you don’t, like. Like. It. But- yeah.”

Yasha gingerly takes the pouch, loosing her hand from Beau’s so that she can open it. She keeps her eyes flickering between Beau and the pouch as she slow, slowly unties the ribbon and pulls the armlets from their place inside.

Beau is unspeakably proud of her work.

It had taken hours at Jester’s side to smooth them out, to shape out the engravings of lightning and flowers that curl along the spirals, to fit the mana wire to the shape of the petals so that they glow in Beau’s blue.

And they do. They glow bright in Beau’s cobalt, an obvious mark of her affection and protection and Yasha stares.

She stares for long seconds, her eyes dart across all of the details,

“Beau,” she says, and her voice is soft and awed, “They’re beautiful.”

Beau gives half of a shrug, a sort of awkward smile on her face,

“Yeah, well. I figured, it’s prob’ly time I mark you.”

Yasha laughs, a bright, odd sort of sound, so loud for her. It sounds like a bell in the morning air, and Beau’s heart twists and jumps in love.  
She smiles, fully, properly, softly,

“Yasha, I- uh-” She swallows, breathes, tries again, but no sound comes out.

  
Yasha’s smile twitches in amusement,

“Don’t say anything. I- um. Here.”

  
Yasha pulls something from an inside pocket on her feathered cloak, cups it between her hands and waits for Beau to hold a hand out before she deposits it.

It is a necklace, a little lightning bolt pendant that glows in Yasha’s pale violet, and Beau’s eyes widen in shock,

“Yash-” She starts, “Are you sure?”

Yasha does not use her words to reply. Instead, she pulls Beau into a hug, loose but warm and crowding and here.

In public.

Where anyone could see them.

Beau burrows unconsciously closer, she tries so hard to keep her stoic, serious persona but she can’t stop the smile that comes with this affection.  
Yasha’s arms loosen, and Beau whines,

“Wait- no- a little longer?”

Yasha gives a breath of a laugh and tightens her arms around Beau once more, closing her eyes in the soft mist-laden morning as the sun rises for the day of the summer solstice, the fairground rides around them whirring to technicolour life.


End file.
